Mixed focus brings benefits to soil, business

The Claughtons crop about 1250 hectares on southern Eyre Peninsula - a mix of their own and leased land.

They operate on a five-year crop program, with two years of each rotation dedicated to pasture and hay production to feed their 2200 Merino ewes as well as hoggets.

After the two years of pastures, they grow canola, then wheat and barley, as well as smaller acreages of beans, before returning to pastures.

Mr Claughton said with such good returns for sheep, it made pastures a particularly profitable break crop. This has been a shift in the past decade, from a previous focus on continuous cropping.

He said pastures had increasingly replaced legume crops in their rotation. They sowed a multispecies pasture made up of vetch, oats, Moby barley, tillage radish, clover and southern ryecorn.

"We treat it like a crop and it puts plenty (of nutrients) into the soil, and sets up the canola terrifically," he said.

The best of the pasture is cut for hay while the rest is used for grazing. They finish lambs on grain from the property.

They also run 500 free range chickens for egg production in their pasture phases, which Mr Claughton said helps boost soil health ahead of the crop rotation.

While also assisting soil biology, he said this was a great way to incorporate his children into the farm.

"If you've got kids interested in farming, this grounds them and gives a sense of purpose and being involved in the farm," he said.

"It teaches them the business side to farming."

The eggs are sold locally in Cummins, Tumby Bay and Port Lincoln under the label Just Got Laid.

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Free range operation a cracking good idea

Mr Claughton said running sheep had also helped reduce reliance on chemicals by targeting weeds.

"Sheep provide more tools in the toolbox, more ways to tackle ryegrass and other things that are a problem in a cropping system," he said.

"Sheep don't know what resistant ryegrass is - they eat it just the same."

He said barley had also begun to play a larger role on their farm.

"We are able to graze it until mid or late July, it's quite a good dual-purpose crop," he said. "In the future, I can see it definitely having a larger application on-farm because of those qualities."

After the barley harvest, the Claughtons sow a mix of summer species, such as millet, safflower and sunflowers, which provides more summer green feed, soil cover and stimulating soil biology.

Mr Claughton said livestock also helped provide financial stability, which took away the need to "grow more and more crops".

"You're not reliant on a header to make all your income," he said.

CONCERN for the health of his soils encouraged Mr Claughton to look for a new way to grow crops.

He said the soil at his Yallunda Flat property ranged from neutral to acidic.

"In the past that's gotten worse with extra fertiliser, so we're trying to wind that back," he said. "We're looking for a better way to grow a good crop that's softer on soil so don't drop pH."

This led to a switch from granular fertiliser to liquid about three years ago.

They apply a calcium-based single super application in April, then the crop is sown with Cropping Solutions liquid fertiliser.

"We put the liquid system onto the airseeder - that's the biggest change to our seeding system," he said.

He said the process involved more planning early in the season.

"It was a bit difficult to get our head around, but is certainly worth doing," he said. "By using a softer fertiliser, hopefully we can build more life in our soil, maintain high production and good yields.

"We haven't seen huge yield increases but we've certainly see more life in our soil."

Mr Claughton said conventional fertiliser applications also created issues with traffic during particularly wet years.

He said his move to refine his system came out of a desire to keep the soils active and healthy.

"The question to ask is how can we do it better?" he said.

"We can't continue to apply artificial fertilisers and expect to be as resilient."