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Identify and assess the condition of and threats to your farm’s natural assets and pests
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Include all aspects of your on-farm natural resources
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Farm sustainability
Use a self-assessment tool (SAT) to
audit your farm’s financial, social and
environmental sustainability.
Tool 5.11 lists a number of SATs
which are general enough for any sheep
producer to use.
Identify and assess soil
erosion risks
Use tool 6.1 in Healthy Soils to assess
and record the land classes across your
farm. From your knowledge of the farm
and the land classes, identify the key
areas at risk of soil erosion and record
them on your aerial photo.
Three forms of soil erosion are reasonably
common on sheep properties:
- Sheetwash (sometimes called rill or
hillslope) erosion is the movement of soil
downslope by running water. The key
factors are rainfall intensity, groundcover,
slope length, gradient and soil erodibility
- Wind erosion is most common in
drier areas. Typically, areas subject to
wind erosion are exposed and have easily
transported, unconsolidated, loose and
fine sand-size aggregates
- Gully erosion is most common
in higher rainfall zones. Gullies
produce poor quality run-off and,
with streambank erosion, are the main
sediment sources across southern
Australia.
Maintaining and/or increasing
groundcover can prevent and/or reduce
the impact of these erosion processes. Set
goals for groundcover in each land class
on your farm using the benchmarks in
procedure 6.2 in Healthy Soils.
Use tools 6.2 and 6.3 in Healthy Soils
to measure groundcover at the sites with
highest erosion risk on your property.
Assess the salinity risk
The primary cause of dryland salinity
in Australia has been the replacement of
deep rooted/perennial native vegetation
with shallow rooted/annual crops and
pastures that use less water. A 1,000ha
farm receiving 500mm of rainfall has
5,000 megalitres of water to manage each
year.
Poor management of the water cycle (see
figure 5.1) directly impacts on many
of our resource management issues,
including soil erosion, high nutrient
loads in rivers, soil acidity and dryland
salinity.
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Figure 5.1 The ‘water cycle’ on a grazing property
(Source: Towards Sustainable Grazing – the Professional Producer’s Guide) |
The excess water (often called recharge)
not used by plants drains below the
root zone causing the water table to
rise. It may bring saline groundwater
up towards, and eventually into, the
root zone, somewhere ‘downslope’
(often called discharge). Sufficient salt
in the root zone can restrict or stop
plant growth. Contact your regional
natural resource management agency
(see signposts) to determine the risk of
salinity in your area. Use the following
tools to assess that risk to your grazing
enterprise:
- The pasture assessment techniques
in tool 7.6 in Grow More Pasture
to measure the perenniality of your
pastures. Compare your result with the
benchmarks in tool 7.6
- If areas are salty, tool 5.1 will help
rate salinity across your paddocks.
SALTdeck cards (see tool 5.10) will help
you identify the indicator species listed in
tool 5.1.
Water draining through the soil leaches
nitrogen and contributes to soil acidity.
Perennial pastures can assist in preventing
soils becoming more acid.
Productive pastures, profitable grazing
systems and improved sustainability are
all about efficient management of the
water cycle.
Assess the condition of
native vegetation
It is important to identify what native
species are present on your property
to inform future management actions.
Native pastures provide reliable (because
of their diversity) and low input
production while helping to maintain
healthy soils and ecosystems. Much
of Australia’s fine wool comes from
native pastures because they provide a
persistent, consistent feed supply.
Native grasses are more persistent when
allowed to recover after grazing, so that
rotational grazing/resting for at least part
of the year is an advantage.
Native pastures respond positively to
low rates of fertiliser, but higher rates
destabilise the pasture, with annuals and
weeds crowding out native perennials,
though this can be mitigated by grazing
management to some degree.
Species identification tools are not
included in this package but tool 5.10
contain many useful references and
links. Most regional NRM authorities
(see signposts) have tools, access to local
experts and information to help sheep
producers identify native species.
Several assessment and monitoring tools
are listed in tool 5.10. Use one of these
tools to quickly and simply assess the
condition of native bush, riparian zones
and native pastures on your farm and for
on-going monitoring.
Discuss and record what you would
like to see in your areas of native bush,
riparian vegetation and native pastures,
what changes could be made to protect
areas at risk (eg, make them larger,
denser, more diverse, etc), and when you
will address these risks.
Survey birds as ‘focal’ species
Birds have received more attention than
any other animal group when designing
landscapes for environmental outcomes.
Birds are a popular choice for several
reasons:
- Birds are mobile - they move across
the landscape at the planning scale of
hectares (paddocks) and kilometres
(properties)
- Birds are relatively easy to survey,
being abundant and visible during the
day
- Birds are placed well towards the
top of food chains - an ibis can eat 250
grasshoppers/day and a magpie can eat
40 scarab beetle larvae/day.
- A diverse range of bird species
inhabiting the ground, the understorey
layers and mature trees indicates the
remnant vegetation is healthy.
Native birds are perhaps the most
useful ‘indicator’ group. A farm with
a rich diversity of birds will also have
a relatively high diversity of trees,
shrubs, mammals, reptiles, frogs and
invertebrates. If the small birds are
missing, there is something wrong with
the habitat. Too many larger birds or
noisy miners indicate a lack of balance.
Use Quickchecks (see signposts) to assess
bird numbers and diversity on your
property. The tool accounts for the fact
that different parts of the farm will have
different bird groups, highlighting the
fact that a variety of habitats is required
across the farm.
Alternatively, keep a small notebook in
the ute and record birds (and/or native
animals) as you come across them in your
ordinary day’s work. All family members
can make entries in the notebook and
later add them to a master list.
Identify changes you can make to the
vegetation on your farm to improve bird
populations, and when you will make
them.
The Birdlife Australia website has ID resources, articles and publications.
Assess the prevalence of
weeds
Pests and weeds threaten both pasture
productivity and natural resources.
The threat posed to biodiversity by weeds
is ranked second only after land clearing.
Successful weed management is much
more than ad hoc weed control. It
is important to work out why weeds
are a problem on your property; set
realistic goals for both pasture and weed
management; undertake the appropriate
weed management practices on time,
every time; check whether your weed
management has been successful and
adapt your plan as needed.
This approach of Deliberation, Diversity
and Diligence is called the ‘3Ds of
Weed Management’. Each step has
key decisions and critical actions. Use
the Deliberation table in tool 5.3 to
compare a stocktake of your current
weed problems (species and density in
key paddocks) and agree on priorities for
action based on what you want the weed
level to be. Record what changes could
be made to weed populations on your
farm by when.
Assess invertebrate pests
Invertebrate pests, including insects and
mites, can significantly reduce pasture
productivity throughout the year.
Across Australia, Red-legged earthmite
(RLEM) infest 20million ha of pasture,
causing $200million damage to the wool
industry alone.
The first step on the farm is to correctly
identify the pest. Your local agronomist
can help you identify the species present.
Other sources of information include
CSIRO Entomology (see tool 5.10) and
State Departments of Primary Industries/
Agriculture.
Identify what you would like the pest
level to be, and what changes could
be made to reduce and keep pest
populations small.
It is important to choose the appropriate
tools to manage each pest, using an
integrated approach (integrated pest
management or IPM – see procedure 5.3) and to monitor the effectiveness of
your approach.
Different pests require different
management strategies. For example, redlegged
earthmite (RLEM) and blue oat
mite (BOM) look very similar but have
different lifecycles. This difference means
that the timing of pesticide spraying
using TIMERITE® (see signposts in
Procedure 5.3) works for RLEM, but not
for BOM.
Assess vertebrate pests
A variety of vertebrate pests affect sheep
farms across Australia, including:
- Introduced pests such as goats, deer,
rabbits, pigs, foxes, and wild dogs
- Native browsers such as kangaroos,
wallabies and wombats.
Many of the habitats that support native
animals and birds on farm also favour
the vertebrate pests. Individual sheep
producers and their families have to find
the balance that suits their situation.
Rabbits damage vegetation by
ringbarking trees and shrubs; prevent
regeneration by eating seeds and
seedlings; and degrade the land through
burrowing and reducing groundcover.
Selective grazing by rabbits changes the
composition of the vegetation.
Where rabbits have caused the slow
decline of, say, bulokes on roadsides in
western Victoria, there are fewer food
trees for species such as the red-tailed
black cockatoo that have declined as a
result, though clearly not from direct
‘competition’ from the rabbits.
The impact of rabbits often increases
during and immediately after drought
and/or fire, when food is scarce and they
eat whatever remains or re-grows.
2-3 rabbits/ha is sufficient to severely
depress the regeneration of native shrubs
and trees.
Spotlight transect counts (the number of
rabbits seen along a set route or transect)
are an accurate way to monitor rabbit
populations, though the number of
rabbits seen in the car headlights when
driving home provides a good enough
indicator of rising or falling rabbit
numbers.
Fox control can increase lamb marking
percentages by as much as 25% when
programs are implemented. In addition,
foxes are major predators of rabbits
(good) and small native mammals and
reptiles (not good).
While monitoring rabbit numbers is
useful on farm, monitoring fox numbers
is not. This is because of the highly
variable (and imprecise) relationship
between predator numbers and their
impacts on prey species, and because
with sheep, it is only at lambing that
predation is likely.
Identify the prevalence of vertebrate pests
and their location on your farm, what
you would like the pest level to be and
what changes could be made to reduce
and keep numbers down.
Audit stock water supplies
The majority of Australia’s livestock drink
from water that falls on the property.
A variety of measures can improve water
use efficiency in sheep grazing systems,
including creating additional watering
points and maintaining healthy soils to
minimise run off.
Healthy soil drives higher pasture
productivity and benefits the
environment through greater use of water
and nutrients in the paddock and less
risk of run-off, erosion and deep drainage
(see procedure 6.4 in Healthy Soils).
Like a feed budget (see tool 8.4 in Turn
Pasture into Product), tool 5.2 will
allow you to calculate how much water
you have, how much your stock need,
and/or how long a dam or water supply
will last.
Use tool 5.2 to complete a stock water
audit of the quantity, quality and
reliability of your stock water supplies.
A life-cycle analysis of water use in red
meat production found that it takes 103 -
540 litres of water to produce a kilogram
of red meat. This is in stark contrast to
50,000 litres per kg meat often quoted
(See: Red meat in the Australian Environment).
Climate change and
greenhouse gases
The Earth’s surface temperature depends
on the balance between incoming and
outgoing radiation.
The main greenhouse gases - water
vapour, carbon dioxide (CO2), methane,
nitrous oxide and ozone - absorb and
re-radiate much of the infrared radiation
released by the Earth’s surface.
All of these gases occur naturally. They
produce a natural greenhouse effect,
maintaining the temperature of the
Earth’s surface some 33°C warmer than it
would otherwise be.
Together, they make up less than 1%
of the atmosphere, which is comprised
mainly of nitrogen and oxygen.
Between 1750 and 2005, methane
concentrations rose by nearly 150% and
nitrous oxide by 18% (IPCC, 2007).
However, atmospheric methane
concentrations have remained relatively
stable since 2000, despite significant
increases in livestock numbers globally.
Australia’s livestock industry (including
dairy) produces 10.2% of Australia’s total
greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Most
of these emissions are methane from the
natural digestion process of cattle and
sheep. Energy generation represents 37%
of Australia’s greenhouse gas emissions.
Climate change impacts on sheep
enterprises
Australian sheep producers have always
dealt with a variable climate and its
associated droughts and floods. Climate
change scenarios suggest this variability
will increase.
In the sheep industry, climate change is
likely to impact on:
- pasture and fodder crops
- water resources
- wool production and quality
- animal health and reproduction
- land stewardship
- competition from other agricultural
activities
- national and international markets.
For example, farm input costs like
electricity, fuel and fertiliser will rise
when a carbon tax is introduced in
Australia.
Increased heat stress associated with
climate change could reduce the
reproductive performance of sheep in
areas where temperature and humidity
increases.
Vegetable fault and dust contamination
in wool could increase where pasture
composition changes, particularly if
weeds and bare ground increase.
Sheep producers now face not only
the continued challenge of managing
production of food and fibre, given
the variability in climatic conditions,
but the new challenges created by the
community’s desire to see reductions in
carbon emissions.
Sheep enterprise impacts on climate
change
A life cycle assessment of sheep meat
production in a southern Australian
production system measured total
emissions of 78 kg CO2 per kilogram
carcase weight.
Wool has excellent ‘natural’ credentials -
it is a renewable, biodegradable protein,
and more than 99% is produced in
extensive grassland terrain.
Use the FarmGAS Calculator (see
signposts) to estimate your farm’s annual
GHG emissions, both at the individual
enterprise activity level and for your farm
as a whole, and to examine the financial
impacts that different greenhouse
mitigation options may have on farm
business profitability.
Signposts  |
Read
Sustainable Grazing – a producer resource: this section of the MLA website provides a collation
of proven best practices for modern
grazing enterprises in southern Australia. www.mla.com.au/research-and-development/environment-sustainability/sustainable-grazing-a-producer-resource
Quickchecks: Natural Resource
Monitoring Tools for Woolgrowers
– tools to measure the health of your
pastures, soils, woody vegetation, farm
watercourses, paddock production levels
and birds. Download your free copy
(2.27MB) on-line at: https://www.wool.com/land/biodiversity/
The Potential Impact of Climate Change
on Woolgrowing in 2029: a report
commissioned by AWI that details the
effects of climate change on the wool
industry. Click here (in online version) to download the report (1.1MB)
Greenhouse Gas Emissions and the Australian Red Meat Industry: a report commissioned by
MLA on greenhouse gas emissions and possible abatement actions. Download here.
View
The Land section of the AWI website has information and case studies relevant to sheep producers on a range of natural resource management issues under the headings of soil, water, biodiversity and regenerative agriculture. Visit https://www.wool.com/land/
Regional NRM Authorities: critical
links for natural resource management
and funding – for access to all regional NRM
Authorities across Australia go to www.nrm.gov.au/regional/regional-nrm-organisations and click on your region.
The PestSmart Toolkit (www.pestsmart.org.au/) provides information and guidance on best-practice invasive animal management on several key vertebrate pest species including rabbits, wild dogs, foxes and feral pigs. Information is provided as fact sheets, case-studies, technical manuals and research reports. Also, view the PestSmart YouTube Channel (www.youtube.com/PestSmart/) for video clips on best practice control methods for pest animal management.
MLA Tips & Tools – a range of
publications are available covering native
vegetation, earthworms, biodiversity
benefits, birds and soil health. Get your
free copies of these MLA ‘Tips & Tools’
by:
Australian Good Meat website: MLA has developed the Australian Good Meat website to showcase the red meat industry's environmental and animal welfare credentials. The website informs consumers about the great work of Australian red meat producers and the high quality product they produce. It also provides a platform for red meat producers to share their story and demonstrate their commitment to best practice and continual improvement.Visit: https://www.goodmeat.com.au/environmental-sustainability/
Climate Change Information: Visit: www.mla.com.au and search for "Communicating Climate Change" for a range of publications.
Or order copies of MLA publications on
Climate Change by:
Managing Climate Variability
Research and Development Program:
a partnership of rural research and
development corporations has developed
and made available a range of practical
tools that help incorporate climate
information into farm business decisions.
Visit: www.managingclimate.gov.au/
Australian Farm Institute: the Australian
Farm Institute is an independent
organisation that conducts research into
farm policy issues to benefit Australian
agriculture. The Institute has released
four publications on different aspects
of emissions trading and its potential
impact on agriculture. You can purchase
these publications online by visiting:
www.farminstitute.org.au
FarmGas Calculator: Calculate the greenhouse gas emissions from your farm and compare the financial performance of different emission reduction activities that could be implemented in your business at: www.farminstitute.org.au/calculators/farm-gas-calculator
Birdlife Australia: visit https://www.birdlife.org.au/
Attend
The MLA EDGEnetwork® program is
coordinated nationally and has a range of
courses to assist sheep producers. Contact
can be made via:
Farmer’s guide to managing climate
risk: a NSW I&I PROfarm course
for sheep producers interested in
understanding weather and climate and
managing risk. For further information:
Apps
Weed ID; The ute Guide. Produced by GRDC. Available for iOS and Android. Designed to assist in the identification of most common weeds found in paddocks throughout Australia.
FeralScan (https://www.feralscan.org.au/) is a community website and Smartphone App that allows you to map sightings of pest animals and record the problems they are causing in your local area. FeralScan can be used by farmers, community groups, pest controllers, local government, catchment groups and individuals managing pest animals and their impacts. Available for iOS and Android.
Birds of Australia. Available for iOS and Android
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Soil: healthy productive soils, as well as gullies, eroded areas and paddocks with special needs (eg, low pH or erodible) 