Southern Farming Systems, south-west node of the Victorian Drought and Innovation Hub and Cam Nicholson, Nicon Rural have been investigating when has south west Victoria historically got the Autumn break and how much feed could farmers expect to grow by the end of the winter months? To assist farmers with forward planning and feed budgeting going into a difficult time of year to manage livestock condition and pastures funded by the Australian Government’s Future Drought Fund.

By using a computer program GrassGro, Cam examined pasture growth back to 1970 to see what insights history can provide in helping to develop winter feed budgets.  Five locations were selected in South West Victoria – Balmoral, Hamilton, Rokewood, Portarlington and Warncoort with results revealing some expected similarities in growth patterns, but also some interesting differences.

The most common date across all locations for the Autumn break was mid-April.  The break was defined as a period of 4 consecutive weeks from March 1 where pasture growth exceeded 10 kg/ha/day.  This excluded rainfall events that only provided a green pick for a week or two.  The average date of the break was about a week earlier on the Bellarine Peninsula (April 6) and became progressively later for locations further west and north with the average date of the break at Balmoral (April 25).

Unsurprisingly the earlier the break, the more feed was grown going into winter, irrespective of the location.  An early break (on March 15) resulted in growth of 2,400 kg/ha on average by the end of May.  If the most common date for the break of April 15 was used, the estimated amount of pasture grown reduced to 1450 kg/ha.  A late break (May 1) means only around 1,000 kg/ha of dry matter is grown by the end of May.

“By using the modelling, we have been able to create charts for each location and for different pasture and crop types (wheat, barley and oats) to appreciate the dry matter likely to be grown by the end of May, June, July and August depending on the date of the Autumn break,” said Cam Nicholson.

Southern Farming Systems will deliver this information to farmers across two workshops on April 30 and May 1 at Rokewood and Yulecart (near Hamilton), 9.30am – 2.00pm going through assessing pasture condition, releasing stock from containment, whole farm pasture feed budget to assess the options and work through the options and decisions funded by Meat & Livestock Australia through the Mixed Farming Project.

“The analysis is very useful in feed budgeting.  For example, if you wish to lamb down on a paddock with a set amount of feed of 1500 kg/ha, the information can be used to determine what is the latest you need to get the break to achieve this.  If the break is later, your options could be using early nitrogen or Gibberellic acid to boost pasture growth” said Lisa Miller, SFS workshop facilitator.

In the workshop participants will have access and learn how to use a simple feed budgeting tool that Cam has created, where they can run scenario’s by entering the different pasture growth and animal needs to work out the overall pasture left at the end of each month for their farm depending on the anticipated or actual time of the break.  If the net amount of pasture across the farm is less than desired, it is easy to appreciate the impact leaving stock in containment for longer after the break.

To learn more about the Autumn/Winter Feedbase Planning workshops and register visit https://sfs.org.au/communications/events