Better late than never.

Finally got to plant soy bean into the last of our fields to be converted to 2 meter permanent bed, probably a bit late, but it is better to have something in the soil to give some ground cover and break the good old monoculture.The planter that we use is "old school" a Nodet vacuum seeder they didn't come out this wide from the factory but we actually, out of 3 old planters made this 9 row unit, it actually does a really good job.There is plenty of sub-soil moisture in the block however 10mm of rain would be perfect, we could irrigate but because the field has been deep ripped to 450mm the amount and time it would take to get down the 650m rows the beans would be water logged. So we have taken the risk , hopefully fingers crossed we will end up with a good crop.The news in our inter cropping trial does not look so good, the wallabies have given the soy beans a complete hiding and as a result the population is very low, what has survived has nodulated as you can see,the problem is there are not enough. The trials and tribulations of farming, just once I would like all the stars to align to see just what I could achieve, here's hoping.

2014.

Well it's a new year, for me the only thing that has changed is the 3 to a 4 at the end of the year. Christmas has been hot and we have not stopped irrigating our crop, we have had quite a few plus 40 degrees centigrade and with the hot dry winds moisture goes real fast. I have been checking on our trial with beans planted in the growing sugar cane crop and unfortunately the native wildlife has taken a real liking to the young soy chewing them off to about 100 mm hopefully they will kick on, where they have not been eaten they are about 300 mm high. Unfortunately there is not anything I can do about it, the joys of agriculture I guess. On a positive note the no till plant cane is really going well with close to one metre of stalk, the crop looks very healthy and reinforces our resolve to keep with the principle of minimum tillage and residue retention. I have attached a photo of my dog "Charlie" after he has been chasing some of the perpetrators of the soy destruction. Also a photo of the no till plant cane that I have documented in past posts. I hope everyone has had a good Christmas and has a prosperous new year.