The Making Sense of Soils ‘in the paddock’ field day held at UWA’s Future Farm in Pingelly was a great success with the latest in decision support tools and weather station information available.

Attendees were able to inspect DAFWA’s newly installed eDemonstration Site weather station, and Glen Brayshaw from Planfarm looked at using this collected weather data for estimating yields, determining fertiliser needs, and undertaking grain marketing, all with the aim of getting the best nutrient use efficiency in crops.

While most tools being presented discussed whole of paddock yields, UWA experts Dr Matthias Leopold and Dr Nik Callow also looked at drivers of variation in the paddock. Matthias pointed out the key properties of soil and how to use simple tools to examine its properties for production purposes, while Nik introduced the GRDC’s frost initiative and his work mapping and understanding how frost effects different parts of paddocks.

The day highlighted the valuable role technology can play in monitoring farms and how online tools can help us turn this information into effective decisions to improve productivity and sustainability of our farms.