SUCCESSFUL trials of dual-purpose canola have paved the way for the development of new longer-season varieties for both grazing and grain production in Australia’s high-rainfall zones (HRZ).
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The four-year research project led by CSIRO’s Dr John Kirkegaard, was supported by the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC), and also involved the South Australian Research and Development Institute (SARDI) and Marcroft Grains Pathology, Victoria.
The project found the potential for farmers to improve profitability on mixed farms using currently available canola varieties for both grazing and grain production.
Canola can produce a significant amount of high-quality forage and regrow after grazing to yield as much as traditional, un-grazed canola crops if “best-bet” management strategies developed during the research are followed.
Dual-purpose canola also retains the break-crop benefits for weeds and disease to clean up paddocks for subsequent cereals or for pasture establishment.
Following on-farm field experiments in NSW, the ACT and South Australia, Dr Kirkegaard’s team last year released the “best-bet” management guides to help southern Australian farmers maximise the profitability from the sheep and canola production.
“Growers in medium-rainfall areas of southern NSW have successfully adopted a system utilising commercially available spring varieties sown two to three weeks earlier than normal (from mid-April) and grazed in early winter prior to bud elongation, with minimal impact on final yield or oil content,” Dr Kirkegaard said.
This year’s trials have focussed on the potential advantages of later-maturing winter, winter-spring varieties over late-spring canola varieties for grain and dual-purpose use in the HRZ.
“In longer-season, high-rainfall areas, the winter and winter-spring varieties, not commercially available in Australia, out-yielded currently available late-spring varieties for the earliest sowing times (March/early April) and provided more forage for grazing sheep,” Dr Kirkegaard said.
“The feasibility of utilising later-maturing winter varieties in cooler, long-season HRZ areas was also demonstrated in field experiments near Canberra ACT, where the later maturity provided opportunities for earlier sowing, a longer grazing period, and higher yield potential of both grazed and ungrazed crops.
“Given the varieties tested in these experiments are unadapted, imported European lines, there seems good scope to develop and make available a long-season dual-purpose canola option for mixed farms in Australia’s HRZ.”
Dr Kirkegaard’s work with canola is now integrated with similar research into dual-purpose wheat with Dr Hugh Dove, to investigate the systems benefits of an integrated farming system, in which sheep can move from pasture to canola and onto wheat, before returning to pasture, thus widening the grazing window.
* More information on dual-purpose grain and grazing canola is available on the GRDC website, www.grdc.com.au/hrz.
