Better Burnett

If the our local paper in the North Burnett is anything to go by, soil biology is a hot topic at the moment.  And why shouldn’t it be?  Many farmers and graziers here in Queensland are seeing the benefits of healthy soils.

Funding from the Australian Government’s Caring for our Country program, allows BCCA to put on a half-day workshop that will introduce the concept, options and details, on how to do, what to do and what to use to make a compost tea – which is proven to help improve the biology and health of soil.

JOIN IN!  Local people sharing local stories.

When: Thursday, 25th February 2010, 9am to 2.30pm (smoko and lunch included)

Where: Mundubbera Community Development Centre,

Cost: FREE!

RSVP: Fri 19 Feb to (07) 4165 3551

If you’d like to GET INVOLVED in hands-on work that will really make a difference to the survival of one of our unique Australian species you can!

We need volunteers who live or holiday in the Bundaberg (Queensland, Aus) region who are willing to get down to the water’s level to protect the White Throated Snapping Turtle nests using meshing, etc.

Volunteer work will require people to have moderate fitness (to walk through sand and bush), but most importantly have a passion for helping the environment!!

If you’d like to be involved, you can phone the BCCA office on 4166 3898 or shoot us an email.

This is an opportunity to get involved from March 2010.

You can make it more fun by getting your friends and family involved.  See you there!

We found this poem whilst sorting out a few old files.  From what we can gather, it was written back in the late 1980’s, before climate change was such a hot topic as it is these days…….We are not sure of the title of the poem.

I am a plain and simple cow with large and hairy ears,

The source of milk and butter now for nigh a thousand years;

But scientists at Mittagong imply that I have sinned

And done the world enormous wrong by simply passing wind,

Which, for a cow, has always been a natural reaction….

In fact, when oats are nice and green, tremendous satisfaction.

To load the fault on other backs, that’s how this mob are made;

It wasn’t me who swung the axe to chop down all the shade;

But now, it seems, the bovine race is condemned en masse

For shooting holes in outer space with deadly methane gas.

Though how I could be blamed escapes my poor detection;

No wind I ever passed was aimed in that obscure direction.

Oh yes, I know it’s not polite, but cows are only human,

We can’t screw our face up tight with bubbles in our rumen;

And anyway, a messy bail is not our pick of places,

Why should we have to jam the tail and practise social graces?

It’s not like dining at the Ritz…..I bet you folks would shudder

With icy fingers on your tits and cold hands up your udder!

Why are we prime suspects?  Why should we head the table?

Have you ever heard the sound effects at daylight in the stable?

The horse has had the best of feeds – molasses, oats and hay

Since knights of yore primed up their steeds to dart into the fray……

But no, they blame the poor old moo, so modest, uncomplaining,

We’ll always end up in the poo while there’s a cow remaining,

I’ve kept it bottled up inside – a passive sort of minion;

No more kow-towing…..I decide to give them my opinion.

I think I’ll go and ferret out where Parliament is meeting

And tell them what I care about the ozone overheating;

I’ll back right up against the rail while they make laws below.

I’ll arch my back and swish my tail……and really let one go!

A Grains BMP workshop is scheduled for Monto, on Tuesday 9th February 2010.  The workshop will be presented by the Queensland Primary Industries and Fisheries (QPI&F).  

What is Grains BMP?

A range of skills and best practices for grains production in Queensland have been described and documented to assist grain growers in their decision making ability.

The workshop covers the following modules:

• Making the most of rainfall

• Farm design and layout

• Crop nutrition and fertility management

• Integrated Pest Management

• Pesticide application

The program has been designed to secure your long-term viability and sustainability.  Three modules will be covered on Tuesday – the modules written in pink.  The remaining two modules will be covered at a later date, this date will be determined by the group on the day.

Click here to download BCCA’s latest newsletter!

The crew at Private Forestry Southern Queensland (PFSQ) are pleased to be able to continue to support and promote sustainable forest management in our region with funding through the federal government’s Caring for our Country program.

Re-vegnet.au is the project, and $4 million over 4 years, most of which is onground work, will include projects that will:

• improve the health, ground cover and productivity of overstocked regrowth forests;
• revegetating recharge zones;
• linking fragmented essential habitat forests; and
• implementing appropriate Fire Management regimes.

Landholders in the Southern Queensland area can participate in these activities immediately or down the track.  But best to look into it now, to begin planning and take advantage of the assistance available.

More information is available from this additional information.

The staff and executives at BCCA would like to wish everyone a safe and happy Christmas 2009.

Our offices in Monto and Mundubbera will be closed during the Christmas-New Year break and will be reopening, and back in the full swing of things on 6 January 2010.

Many thanks to all we have worked with over the past year, and we look forward to another exciting year for 2010!

This week, BCCA continued to grow its project base to include the grains industry, after running a full workshop together with QPI&F extension officers taking grain growers through the recently developed Grains BMP.

The Grains BMP was put together by QPI&F together with AgForce and Fitzroy Basin Association and BCCA saw an opportunity to present this to the willing participants from Kingaroy and surrounds.  The group were some of the first to try the online version of the Grains BMP (available here).  Local BGA AgriServices agronomists, Ian Crossthwaite and Damien Sippel joined in and will be able to assist landholders further.

Participants in the Kingaroy workshop qualified for a small grant under the ‘Better Catchments’ program that will be put towards something that will improve soil management on their property.  Two participants have already got their projects in, one will be putting the funding toward modifying their planting equipment to become zero till operators and another to upgrade their GPS system for more accurate controlled traffic.

We’re very pleased to see such eager uptake of this sort of project.

Stay tuned for more information about up and coming workshops and funding opportunities!!

BCCA extension officer, Leeanne Witcher and grower Stewart Hansen from the south Burnett get to work on the online version of the Grains BMP.

A one-day Stocktake workshop was conducted on Tuesday, 24th November 2009,  for South Burnett land managers.  Stocktake is a paddock-scale land condition monitoring and management package. It was developed to provide grazing land managers with a practical, systematic way to assess land condition and long-term carrying capacity and to calculate short-term forage budgets.

The workshop, delivered by the QLD Primary Industries and Fisheries, was attended by 6 landholders in the South Burnett.   The practical training workshop stepped participants through the technical concepts and demonstrated field assessment techniques and database use. 

If you would like a Stocktake workshop to be delivered in your area, please contact BCCA to express your interest.

Over fifty graziers packed the Monto Town Hall on Friday to update their skills in sown pasture establishment in time for the coming wet season. 

The full day workshop, hosted by the Burnett Catchment Care Association (BCCA) was part of Better Catchments; an Australian Government “Caring for Our Country” program.  The workshop was presented by Queensland Primary Industries and Fisheries (QPI&F) Extension Officer, Damien O’Sullivan who is one of the few remaining specialists in pastures in the Burnett.

Mr O’Sullivan opened the floor to the keen attendees to share their successful and not so successful experiences with establishing improved pastures in the North Burnett.  Mr O’Sullivan also discussed the tools available to graziers in assist in reducing the risk of pasture establishment such as “HowOften”, a simple rainfall pattern predictor based on historical rainfall records. 

As added enticement for the participants, each were offered the choice of two soil management incentives; either soil test vouchers or the computer mapping program “Phoenix” to enhance their grazing enterprises.  Both were eagerly received by the participants.

After a great BBQ lunch put on by local agricultural business, Farmstuff, the crowd ventured into the heat to visit some local properties and discuss appropriate sown pasture species with the potential to be established when the season breaks. 

BCCA Chairman, Paul Lobegeier said he was extremely impressed to see so many graziers in one room, all keen to be prepared once the rains do come.

Photo:  Monto grazier John Sinclair, sharing his sown pasture experience with the workshop group on his property, “Hollow Hills”.