ONE of the driest seasons on record has vindicated fourth generation farmers Brett and Marylou Hutchinson's decision to maintain a mixed enterprise.
While watching many of their neighbours switch to an all-crop regime, the couple will see out this year well placed to take advantage of good prices for grain, prime lamb or wool.
Farming just over 1700 hectares of mixed cropping and livestock at West Dale, west Beverley, Brett reflects on the vagaries of agriculture which this year saw sheep prices take off as predictable supply tightened as farmers quit numbers in favour of cropping.
"I don't put all my eggs in one basket," he said. "Doing that this year with cropping has ended up being very tough and I always think having a mix balances things out.
"For example, over the last few years wheat prices have been good and sheep have been bad but now sheep prices are looking really good."
Historically Beverley has been known as a sheep area as the higher rainfall made it difficult for conventional crop establishment.
This has changed with no-till and lower rainfall years.
Total rainfall this year has been 240mm compared to the average of between 450mm and 480mm.
While they have always grown barley and oats, the Hutchinsons did try wheat in 1999 but found it yielded no better than barley, so it was dropped from the rotation.
They started growing canola three years ago because not only was it a good cash crop, it also played an important role as a cleaning crop.
Canola also was introduced because Brett upgraded machinery to handle the small seeds.
A total of 305ha of canola was sown this year made up of Tornado, Thunder and Cobbler varieties, sown at 7kg/ha.
"I'll increase the Cobbler and Thunder over the next few years and I'll kick Tornado out," he said.
"We're looking for varieties we can direct head."
With harvesting just started, Tornado canola on gravel country is averaging around 700kg/ha with 43 to 44 per cent oil content.
Brett used to grow Harrington barley but now has 225ha of the Baudin variety which he started growing in 2004 because it was the only malting barley taken at the local CBH grain bin.
The barley was seeded at 80kg/ha and Brett said it had gone surprisingly well, considering the rainfall.
"Some paddocks might get to a 2.5t/ha average while others will achieve 1.5t/ha," he said. "But we might have problems with screenings."
Oats are grown on 110ha, mainly for hay and stock feed.
The soils vary from mainly loam over gravel, to gravelly loam and all gravel.
Brett said gravel was good in the wet years as they were the first soils to dry out but as the seasons were getting drier, he would be trying a new product LureH2O on the lease blocks next growing season to address the non-wetting soil problem.
With the surrounding rocky undulating landscape, the Hutchinsons have always run sheep.
Brett said they run about six sheep/ha during the cropping months which then drops to about four sheep/ha in the summer months.
With wool prices on the increase, they are concentrating more on wool at the moment.
After switching from Corriedales to Merinos in the mid-1980s, they now have 3300 Merino ewes, 31 Merino rams, 25 Poll Dorset rams, 1600 mixed hoggets and 550 1.5-year-old wethers.
Out of the Merino ewes, 2100 are a mixture of five age groups and are mated to Merino rams for a self-replacing wool flock.
All Merino rams are sourced from Westbrook Merino stud as the sheep are suited to the area and known for their ultrafine genetics and wool quality.
Brett said their wool was improving each year and they just received 1027 cents for 11 bales of 17.6 micron greasy.
"We range between 70 to 72pc yield," he said.
"We're trying to get the right balance where the average micron is between 18 and 19 and to get a good size sheep so there is value if they're used for meat."
Lambs from another 1200 Merino ewes are mated to Poll Dorsets for prime lamb.
The Poll Dorsets come from Shirlee Downs and Dongadilling studs, Quairading.
"Last year was a poor year for lambs," Brett said. "From 2000 ewes, we got 55pc lambing percentage whereas in a normal year we get 85 to 90pc.
"This year out of 2000 Merino ewes we got 81pc overall lambing and one mob did 93pc."
The crossbred lambs will go through the feedlot starting in February.
"We sell all the crossbred lambs so they don't mix in with the wool flock," Brett said.
The Merino ewes, crossbred lambs and wethers are also kept on separate properties as an extra precaution.
Every year, Brett buys four to five Merino and Poll Dorset rams each to spread the costs over the years.
"If you don't buy one year, you'll end up buying 10 the following year," he said.
The Hutchinsons have not had to hand feed yet but did sell about 550 old ewes earlier than usual before shearing this year, due to the poor season.
Last year 200 tonnes of grain was trail-fed out but due to the price of feed this year and lack of feed in paddocks, they will soon be trialling new lick feeders.
Water for stock is not a problem as the home farm has a good dam supply and a creek with water all year round in some parts due to underground water, as well as underground water that can be pumped if needed.
One of the lease blocks has got bore water and the other has good dam supplies.
With family cropping records going back to 1949, Brett has seen changes in farming practices over the years up to when he returned to the family farm in 1982, after working on a neighbouring farm after finishing school.
Time spent wood-cutting the original York gum, wandoo and sheoak, ripping rabbit burrows and ploughing was replaced by ripping up the ground with a scarifier and pulling a combine over it, up until three years ago when that was also replaced with direct drilling with an air-seeder.
"It's a one pass operation now," Brett said.
While this year is the driest year that he can remember, Brett said they had actually got out of it better than a lot of other people.
"If everybody's in the same boat, it's not a problem you take personally," he said. "Years like these you can't do much about it."
