July 2004 Study Tour

Wednesday 18^th August

Northern Paloose, Washington state, west of Spokane - Dr Diana Roberts/Karl Kupers

• In these drier areas, alternative crops are really struggling to match the performance of cereals (especially wheat).

• Quite limited marketing opportunities in the area (few livestock, no oilseed crusher, only talk of a biodiesel plant).

• Biodiesel is being promoted more as a blend (eg 20% bio/mineral diesel). Could value add to biodiesel production by making special purpose oils (eg transmission) rather than just diesel. Pure biodiesel is not very attractive in these colder areas because it gels at temps much higher than mineral diesel, canola and mustard make very low nitrous oxide emissions.

• In these areas of sharply rolling landscapes, it is the rises which have the greatest depth because the sluiwes (creek lines) have been gouged out by glacial activity.

Karl Kupers

• Has been farming on the same place for 30 yrs plus several generations before him but all leased country - no ownership at all, currently farm size is 4,400 acres.

• Summer fallows are part of the system because it is only 11-12” total rainfall and use fallow to prepare for winter wheat which is their big income earner. Karl only uses a bit of winter wheat because he is running a more diverse rotation with spring wheat/barley, peas, lentils and safflower. Spring wheat only getting about half the yield of winter wheat but gap is closing.  He may move to more winter wheat though if seasons remain dry; winter wheats are yielding up to 60 bu/ac.

• Karl is an enthusiastic Beckite who has been all no-till for a long time - started with Beck in 1995. Early attempts at no-till in the area (late 60’s and early 70’s failed because they were using very simple rotations, wheat/fallow).

• Is a very strong advocate against subsidies in US and believes that they will be drastically cut back within the next 5 years.  He has gone to the no-till/diverse rotation system as a pledge to his land owners that he will maintain the productivity of the land but also be in a position to farm profitably once subsidies are pulled back.

• He has created a marketing group (Shepherd’s Grains, www.shepherdsgrain.com) which is a syndicate of dedicated no-till farmers who are supplying a precise standard of dark northern spring high gluten wheat (a mix of 2 varieties) to small consumers (eg bakeries, pizza shops), promoted on the grounds that it has been produced in sustainable farming systems.
  

• • Economically, it is hard to maintain diverse rotations if you can’t market all the crops.
    
    
  • They are all certified by the Food Alliance; an NGO which certifies crops and farms and tries to inform the public about sustainable farming. Based in Portland, Oregon (www.thefoodalliance.org).
    
    
  • Food Alliance has 3 types of criteria - social, agrichemical and ecological/biodiversity. Food Alliance does not allow GMs in its certification scheme at this stage.
    
    
  • currently selling about 60,000 bu/yr which is all stored on farm until Karl calls for some from selected growers to blend into the precise specifications.
    
    
  • Karl plans to progressively introduce “improvements” to his product such as analysis of grain nutritional quality (and trying to produce better grain) and production of crops with biodiesel.
    
    
  • System is entirely traceable although this is of no market value at the moment
    
    
  • Perhaps his success (and we are only talking small tonnages) is more about his marketing prowess, the consistency and quality of the product rather than the market valuing sustainability on the farm.
    
    

• Has 10% of the farm under lucerne (sells hay to local horses) plus some more under perennial grasses (harvested for sale to reclamation schemes) because he wanted some perennials in the rotation. The native vegetation is mostly cool season grasses, some cool season broadleaved plants, a few warm season broad leaved plants and a tiny component of warm season grasses. He is trying to mimic this mix with his rotation.

• Uses a Biomax single disc drill and a Great Plains disc seeder with leading coulters.

• Currently in a major drought (only 50% of average rainfall which is almost unheard of in this region).

• Has noticed that in some of his paddocks vigorously growing crop circles have appeared. These are in paddocks which have been in long term no-till and have come out of a lucerne stand. The crop circles (no discernible pattern to them) have occurred in established lucerne, spring wheat and safflower. Karl wonders whether with the lucerne and intensive rotation the ground has been dried out so much that the clays have fractured and allowed deeper water to wick and diffuse up into the root zone (the soil is damper in these areas). It did not happen in winter wheat which was set up with a fallow or in a first year lucerne stand. Could it be microbial/organic improving water holding capacity and release or simply soil variability which is masked in better years ?

• He believes that in his very dry country (soils are either warm and dry or wet and frozen) that microbial activity is very low and that it is taking a long time for the soils to respond to his management - although he is starting to see some changes now after 7-8 yrs of no-till.

• Disc drills seem to be contributing to a plough pan but does not see any deleterious impact of tram lines in the paddock (uses GPS for steering seeder and boom spray so each tramline is travelled over 3-4 times in a crop but then shifts them for the next crop and they disappear. I assume that they are not bare wheel tracks. Has started some deep ripping demos but not sure how they are performing yet.

• Expects his crops to extract water to 3.5 feet, especially safflower.

We said goodbye to Jim our bus driver. Again his exuberance was evident in the tears he shed as we said our goodbyes and gave him our last tips - which he greatly appreciated. He was a most amazing bus driver. That evening we flew to San Francisco via Denver, where there was a massive thunderstorm that delayed our departure slightly.  

Thur 19^th to Sun 22^nd August

The cool moist air of San Fran was refreshing but made it hard to view the many interesting sights that were distant. We did though all get to see the Golden Gate bridge, the trams, the Pier, the shops, the roadside entertainers and the many interesting shops. It was not hard to soak up the fun of San Fran. Although many were now looking forward to getting home to their family and friends.

The flight home was safe for all - thankfully!  It took most of us 5-7 days to recover from the jet-lag.  But we all came away realising that we had seen some of the worlds most interesting agriculture, deserts, mountains, plains, irrigation, cars, trucks, scientists, farmers and others. We learnt the importance of tipping in the American way.

Concluding thoughts

• It was an insightful trip covering many km of mostly dryland agriculture (The Great Plains), with many new friends made and we learnt a lot – some of which is highlighted here.

• No till has continued to be increasingly adopted throughout North America and is now viewed a common tool to improve soils and increase crop yields.

• There was minimal concern about herbicide resistance wherever we went.

• GM technology is firmly embraced for weed management and has greatly aided no-till.

• GM has been experienced as a great boon to farming systems by everybody we saw. In some cases it has transformed canola into the most profitable crop. Researchers have praised GM canola as taking huge pressure off resistance management especially because it has made grass weed control in wheat so easy. 

• Most don’t want RR wheat.  GM corn is widely used (both RR, Liberty link and Bt). Did not encounter any problems with GM crops becoming problem weeds in subsequent crops.

• Great Plains has native sunflowers so development of RR sunflowers doubtful.

• Liberty link canola, with better yields and less policing, is more popular than RR canola.

• Disc seeders are more common in dry areas while knifepoints are used more in Canada and in the wetter areas.

• Disc seeders are preferred in all regions for warm season crop establishment.

• Need to explore the use of disc seeders in more regions of Australia.

• Wheat row spacings are narrow (6-7”) with discs and wider (10-12”) with knife openers.

• It probably does take about 5 years for strong benefits of no-till to become clear.

• Beneficial impacts of no-till plus diverse rotations may be slow to develop in dry areas.

• Long-term benefits from no-till were consistently discussed with increased organic matter.

• It would be useful if someone researched the accumulating benefits of no-till.

• There was discussion about whether one cultivation would undo the years of benefit of no-till.

• We discussed the idea of whether we need to grow summer crops in our low rainfall southern Australian conditions, with our often poor soil?

• Proso millet is a good crop prior to corn and corn is good prior to sunflowers.

• We may be getting a false impression of the agronomic viability of some crops because of the distorting effects of government subsidised crop insurance.

• The CPR (Conservation Reserve Program) greatly reduces the amount of land that grown to crops and if this is lifted there will be a lot more grain grown in the US.

• Short season millets in US are daylight sensitive which is probably why they are not flowering early in Australia (it needs days that are shortening, not getting longer).

• Apparently, for a rotation to fully exploit the environment, it must fail in some years (in our case, mostly in drought years).

• A cover crop is grown for its rotational benefits rather than for cash at the end of the year.

• “Successful” farming probably maximises carbon cycling.

• No-till increases the chances of CO₂ that is released from OM being recovered by a crop.

• Stack the rotation for max benefit from the break, we will need to stack two different cool season broadleaved crops to ensure good grass weed control.

• Before you can determine a rotation/farming system you need to decide what you want to achieve.

• We discussed a possible stacked rotation for southern Australia without livestock:

  • Wheat/wheat/millet/grain sorghum/vetch or medic or pea or lupin/canola or mustard

  • Need disc drill for non-wheat crops

  • Knock down stubble after first wheat, leave stubble standing after second wheat, sorghum stubble will hold peas up, if SUs are used on first wheat, can millet survive? After millet there is a winter fallow - may address transient salinity and will give grain sorghum every opportunity, could extend 2 wheats into 3 if one failed.

• Perhaps we can consider stacked rotation for 400 mm without livestock

  A diverse rotation will not be sustainable if all the crops, or products, can not be marketed.

  We need to be as innovative about marketing as we do about agronomy

  Cool season and warm season crops overlap a lot in Canada so maybe they do not give the same rotational benefits of a “true” winter/summer crop rotation, perform more as a late sown spring crop, none seen in Swift Current area.

  The CWB operates in western Canada only, many similarities to AWB with a lot of farmers being keen to see de-regulation.

  Perhaps wheat is more salt sensitive than the text books suggest.

  Canadian R&D seems to be doing similar things to us, eg precision farming, green seeker chlorophyll meters…ie no apparent revolutions for us to seize, except perhaps GM.

  No-till has mostly been driven for avoiding catastrophes – soil erosion mostly.

  American subsidies may be reduced in the future – talk is cheap, time will tell.

• Tall stubble has benefits for pulses in Canada for reasons other than snow trapping.