Moisture for germination and growth is critical to crop performance. Many different strategies exist to conserve soil moisture pre and post sowing, including spraying and tillage.
Online Farm Trials contains 150 trials covering issues that include: managing moisture variability within paddock; crop rotations that optimise moisture availability in the sequence; impacts of break crops and summer crops for production; and, future crop gains and interactions between soil moisture and nitrogen conservation, including timing of fertiliser application. There are 65 published trials for wheat, 16 for canola and 16 for barley linked to soil moisture conservation and use. There are also trials for lupins (6) and vetch (4).
For further information on soil moisture strategies, refer to the following case studies on low rainfall environments that consider summer weed control options to managing soil moisture:
Aims:
The aim of this investigation was to use the cropping systems simulator APSIM to assess the impact of high levels of sodicity chlorine, electrical conductivity and boron on the growth and yield of a wheat crop (cv. Yitpi) grown in the BCG Systems Trial.
Aims:
Aims:
To provide a demonstration site to observe the effects of mouldboard ploughing vs. no cultivation on non-wetting soils and crop growth and yield.
Aims:
To assess the interaction between clay rate and incorporation methods to overcome soil water repellence and improve crop establishment and productivity.
Aims:
The demonstration undertaken at four on-farm sites seeks to test the Yield Prophet tool to determine its relevance and usefulness to growers of the West Midlands region in determining the most efficient and effective nitrogen strategy.
Aims:
To determine the critical concentration of zinc for plant growth in chickpea shoots
Aims:
Demonstrate best practice phalaris establishment and management at the PPS/EverGraze site at Mooneys Gap which should provide information to producers to give them confidence to increase phalaris use.
Aims:
To demonstrate the ideal depth for optimum canola establishment in local conditions.
Aims:
To discuss canola variety selection for 2007.
Aims:
To investigate the impact that stubble treatments (burning, cultivation, harrowed/flattened or standing stubble) imposed towards the end of the fallow have on the yield of winter crops.
Aims:
To investigate whether plant growth affected by sodic subsoils.
Aims:
To quantify how paddock stubble load and weed burden during summer can affect available soil water, nutrients and subsequent crop yield.
Aims:
To quantify how paddock stubble load and weed burden during summer can affect available soil water, nutrients and subsequent crop yield.
Aims:
To quantify how paddock stubble load and weed burden during summer can affect soil water, nutrients and subsequent crop yield.
Aims:
To determine if various farm management techniques improve the storage of out-of-season rainfall and whether this leads to improvements in crop growth and/or yield.
Aims:
To determine if various farm management techniques improve the storage of out-of-season rainfall and whether this leads to improvements in crop growth and/or yield.
Aims:
To determine if various farm management techniques improve the storage of out-of-season rainfall and whether this leads to improvements in crop growth and/or yield.
Aims:
To determine if various farm management techniques improve the storage of out-of-season rainfall and whether this leads to improvements in yield.
Aims:
The GRDC project ‘Maintaining profitable farming systems with retained stubble - upper Eyre Peninsula’ aims to produce sustainable management guidelines to control pests, weeds and diseases while retaining stubble to maintain or improve soil health, and reduce exposure to wind erosion. The major outcome to be achieved is increased knowledge … read more
Aims:
The GRDC project ‘Maintaining profitable farming systems with retained stubble - upper Eyre Peninsula’ aims to produce sustainable management guidelines to control pests, weeds and diseases while retaining stubble to maintain or improve soil health, and reduce exposure to wind erosion. The major outcome to be achieved is increased knowledge … read more
Aims:
The GRDC project ‘Maintaining profitable farming systems with retained stubble - upper Eyre Peninsula’ aims to produce sustainable management guidelines to control pests, weeds and diseases while retaining stubble to maintain or improve soil health, and reduce exposure to wind erosion. The major outcome to be achieved is increased knowledge … read more
Aims:
To evaulate the nitrogen fixing capacity of various legume species grown on Kangaroo Island.
Aims:
To monitor moisture retention and nitrogen accumulation under cultivated and chemical fallow regimes.
Aims:
Toreport on decisions used by NSW grains industry advisers to determine nitrogen fertiliser management recommendations.
Aims:
To demonstrate more efficient deep ripping of a dry compact sandy soil and to assess any benefits of improved rain infiltration and crop yield.
Aims:
To provide growers and advisers with a better understanding of the benefits of deep ripping and in particular depth of deep ripping required to optimise crop yield and profit.
Aims:
To provide growers and advisers with a better understanding of the benefits of deep ripping and in particular depth of deep ripping required to optimise crop yield and profit.
Aims:
Aims:
Aims:
Aims:
To investigate the effect of early or delayed sowing on reduction of ryegrass numbers in combination with different preemergent herbicides.
Aims:
To investigate the effect of early or delayed sowing on reduction of ryegrass numbers in combination with different pre-emergent herbicides
Aims:
Compare the yield responses of canola varieties sown at three sowing dates (9 April, 23 April and 12 May).
Aims:
To investigate the influence of rate, application timing and soil type of the activity of Lure H20 as a pre-sow soil wetting agent in the cropping phase.
Aims:
This experiment reports the effect of three sowing dates on the timing of anthesis, grain yield and grain quality parameters for a range of commercially available and advanced bread wheat and durum varieties.
The combination of phenology and sowing date (SD) determines the probable timing of environmental stresses (frost and heat stres… read more
Aims:
To compare and evaluate the yield effect from cultivation, before seeding versus a full cut system in a wheat crop.
Aims:
To evaluate a range of seeding modifications or additions with the aim of improving crop establishment and yield on water repellent sandplain soil.
Aims:
To evaluate the performance of crops (barley in 2009) when pasture cropped over different perennial species established on deep pale sands.
Aims:
To predict the risk of PRR disease and potential yield losses in chickpea, and detect P. med inoculum in soil from commercial paddocks.
Aims:
Aims:
Aims:
To build on previous research by updating knowledge of the benefits, including disease control and nutrition, of fluid delivery systems.
Aims:
To determine the success of Pasture Cropping for different starting pasture compositions and crop sequences (i.e. the difference betweencropping year-after-year compared to doing it once) in comparison to No Till cropping and pasture treatments. Success will be assessed by the profitability of the crop, the grazing value of the pasture, perennia… read more
Aims:
To determine how post-grazing nitrogen application rates and post flowering rainfall affect the recovery of Mace and Trojan grain wheat crops after grazing.
Aims:
To evaluate the economic benefit and effectiveness of different herbicide treatments on mixture of summer grassses and melons.
Aims:
The GRDC project ‘Maintaining profitable farming systems with retained stubble - upper Eyre Peninsula’ aims to improve farm profitability while retaining stubble in farming systems on upper Eyre Peninsula (EP). Weed control in stubble retained systems can be compromised when stubbles and organic residues intercept the herbicide and prevent i… read more
Aims:
To identify herbicide sensitivities of new lupin varieties with the view to reduce their yield losses due to herbicide damage. Mandelup was included as a standard variety for comparison in the trial.
Blue lupins are problematic in narrow leave lupin production, especially in the Northern Agriculture Region of WA Wheatbelt and no herbic… read more
Aims:
To develop high water-use farming systems that integrate crops with perennial pastures.
Aims:
To test if no-till crops grown on clay soils in the low rainfall, southern Mallee environment would yield better if more straw could be retained on the soil surface from the previous crop.
Aims:
The broad aim of this 3 year SAGIT funded project was to investigate if current management tools for medic based pastures, such as herbicides, fertilisers and rhizobial inoculants, are affecting N fixation by medic pastures under field conditions typical of the upper Eyre Peninsula.