The Soil Wealth and Integrated Crop Protection (ICP) project works with growers to put soil management and plant health research into practice. In this column, we showcase the latest news from our network of demonstration sites across Australia, including Victoria, New South Wales and a new site in Queensland. Soil Wealth ICP Phase 2 (VG16078) is a strategic levy investment under the Hort Innovation Vegetable Fund.

The Soil Wealth ICP team works with vegetable growers to integrate profitable and sustainable practices into modern commercial production systems through a diverse range of demonstration sites.

These sites provide an opportunity to test new farming practices and technologies out in the field, and share the results and lessons learnt with the wider industry.

Below are some recent highlights from a selection of the project’s demonstration sites around the country, but you can find out more at soilwealth.com.au/demo-sites/.

Mulgowie hosts new Queensland demo site

The Mulgowie Farming Company is a family-owned producer growing conventional and organic sweet corn, green beans and broccoli across Australia. With a strong focus on innovation and sustainable farming practices, Mulgowie has teamed up with Soil Wealth ICP to take their soil management to the next level.

Andrew Johanson, Mulgowie’s Agronomy Process Improvement Manager, has driven advances in soil health through controlled traffic farming, cover crops and minimum tillage.

“This has seen the soil’s water infiltration and holding capacity increase – the soil becomes more friable and less compacted, and yields increase, with plants showing more resilience to weather extremes,” Andrew said.

The next step in improving their soils is to understand how to manage beneficial soil biology. Working with Kelvin Montagu from the Soil Wealth ICP team, Mulgowie will be looking at how to get the beneficial fungi, mycorrhizae, back into their soil.

Previous sampling has shown very low levels of mycorrhizae in the soil and corn roots at the home farm at Mulgowie in the Lockyer Valley.

“Mulgowie’s reduced tillage is giving mycorrhizal fungi a fighting chance to re-establish in the soil now that they are not being regularly chopped up by cultivation. We now need to see if we can use soil phosphorus test results to target paddocks to give the mycorrhizal fungi the best chance to re-establish,” Kelvin said.

Keep an eye out for future updates on re-establishing mycorrhizal fungi in vegetable soils, and what benefits this brings to the corn and bean crops and soil.

Soil Wealth ICP team member Carl Larsen visits the Koo Wee Rup demonstration site.

For more information on boosting mycorrhizal fungi in Australian vegetable soils, read this case study.

A breezy video update from Koo Wee Rup, Victoria

Soil Wealth ICP team member Carl Larsen braved the windy spring weather at the Koo Wee Rup demonstration site in Victoria to bring growers a short update on how things were progressing at the site.

Check out the video as Carl prepared to take some pre-plant pathogen soil tests before a leek crop was planted in October 2021.

Additional updates are available on the Koo Wee Rup demo site Facebook page, including videos on how to take soil samples, the role of cover crops and reduced tillage, and informing irrigation decisions through remote weather stations.

Cowra hosts virtual shed walk on microwave weed technology

Marc Hinderager oversees the Cowra demo site with Ed Fagan.

The Cowra demonstration site in New South Wales is the latest site to host Growave’s next generation microwave technology to control weeds.

The unit was adapted following lessons learnt from a test run at the Koo Wee Rup demonstration site in Victoria in early 2021, before heading north to New South Wales.

In this virtual shed walk, Liam Hescock and the team from Growave explain how the microwave technology works. Grower Ed Fagan also discusses his experience and expectations of how the unit could control wireweed, caltrop (catheads) and nutgrass in his crops at Cowra.

Watch the video.

New resources from the Soil Wealth ICP project

The Soil Wealth ICP team recently released some useful resources to help vegetable and potato growers improve their management of soils and plant health. Take a look below or explore the full range of resources. 

7-part video series: Soil Biology in Vegetable Production Masterclass

The Soil Wealth ICP’s first Soil Biology in Vegetable Production Masterclass was held virtually over two days.

In August 2021, Soil Wealth ICP’s first Soil Biology in Vegetable Production Masterclass was run online over two days. The project has released seven videos from the masterclass, where team members and expert speakers focus on a different topic.

• Part 1: Soil biology in vegetable production – basic principles
• Part 2: Breakdown of organic matter and agrichemicals in vegetable soils
• Part 3: Nitrogen availability
• Part 4: Soil biology and soil structure
• Part 5: Soil fumigation and effects on soil biological communities
• Part 6: Soil-borne disease suppression in vegetable crops
• Part 7: Use of biological products in Australian vegetable production

What changes can Aussie growers expect in ICP?

This global scan looks into the changes affecting ICP tools available to vegetable growers.

The global scan looks at some of the changes affecting the integrated crop protection tools available to vegetable growers.

Read more about the restrictions and de-registrations that have occurred internationally and suggestions about how vegetable growers can prepare for possible changes in Australia.

Webinar recording: Advancements in ICP for profitable veg production

There are a number of important advancements and lessons from Europe implementing a mandatory ICP approach in vegetable production systems.

Watch this webinar recording to hear from leading researchers and practitioners from Europe and Australia about building ICP into your production system and preparing for potential changes.

Find out more

For more information, please contact project leaders Dr Gordon Rogers on 02 8627 1040 or gordon@ahr.com.au and Dr Anne-Maree Boland on 03 9882 2670 or anne-mareeb@rmcg.com.au.

This project has been funded by Hort Innovation using the vegetable research and development levy and contributions from the Australian Government.

Project Number: VG16078

Cover image: Growave’s next generation microwave technology has moved to New South Wales.