Breadalbane Blueprint

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Project Blueprint

Key Metrics

Soil Carbon% (0-30cm)

Soil Carbon Stocks 0-30cm

Property Carrying Capacity

Mean

2.17%

78 t C/ha

28 SDH/100mm

Range

0.46 - 2.03%

55-98 t C/ha

2-35 SDH/100mm using actual graze history per paddock

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Farm Profile

Property

‘Breadalbane’

Location

Proserpine, Qld

Enterprise

Cattle Backgrounding

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Your Goals

...these are what we have heard so far, they will change... please update as applicable

Livestock

Increase numbers as Salisbury Plains capacity increases, towards a target top of circa 1500 Steers, (where prev has been circa 950-1200 through annually)

Land

Increase soil fertility and pasture quality to increase animal performance (as ADG gains)

Continue development of larger paddocks to increase control over grazing

People

Free up Pauls time to allow greater development input at Salisbury Plains

Achieve sufficient development to allow simpler daily operations with less labour

Business

Improve ADG to increase operating efficiency

Increase stocking rate to generate more profit for development elsewhere (?)

Grazing

Continue imcremental improvements coming from sub-division

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Strategic Grazing Assessment

Metric

Current Value

Trial Goals

Long Term Target

Comments

Carrying Capacity

The long term LSU Days /Ha per 100mm rainfall

28 SDH/100mm

No change

Farm Average:

tbc SDH/100mm

Rest to Graze %

Average % of days paddocks are in recovery versus being grazed

81%

No Change

90%+

This is the rolling proportion of time paddocks spend in rest versus graze

# Paddocks per Mob

Average across the recent 12mths

~ 15:1

No Change

20+

Will improve as the planned water points and paddock sub-divisions allow larger mobs

Density Average graze density as Head/Ha

15-17

Introduce leader follower principle

20+ head/ha

Can become a greater focus once greater control over desired recovery period is achieved

Stocking Rate : Carrying Capacity

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Observations

Carrying Capacity

There are 24 months of graze data in MaiaGrazing that provides a good indication of the spread in production, on a per paddock basis to help visualise where the actual carrying capacity has been in order to be realistic about future increase.

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Infrastructure

NOTE: It is recommended that the majority of new fencing & water point infrastructure be delayed until after Carbon project baselining is completed to allow this to be included in additionality requirements for any potential project registration.

Paddocks

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6 paddocks (roughly a third of paddocks) represent 77% of total farm area, meaning there is still large areas of development remaining to bring increase paddock count per mob, increase recovery rates and density required to achieve potential soil Carbon increases

The constraint to potential sub-division is adequate water points to meet the needs of larger mobs for reduced graze periods necessary in a greater number of smaller paddocks

Stock Water

Multiple bores to pull from, some needing testing for flow rates/adequacy etc

There are multiple creek access points for stock water

Pastures

The standout features of Breadalbane pastures are:

Pasture Variation

The observed variation in structure, quality, species, diversity is significant, between the obviously less developed areas of what is currently Bullock paddock through to the fantastic mix of legumes/grasses in the Front sections

This really just suggests there remains a lot of upside potential in the Bullock areas and that older cattle with more teeth are possible a better option for rotation there until it progresses.

Plane of Nutrition

The variation in feed is not matched by variation in stock class consuming it, ie the implementation of a desirable graze rotation down to 1 or 2 mobs means there is very likely having an impact on the animal plane of nutrition, per rotation, moving the same animals through such variable feed

This is accentuated on Breadalbane given the dominant stock Class is young cattle, say 200-400kg range, ranging through feed of differing quality.

Options to address this are in the Recommendations below.

Pasture presentation

the system of graze rotation being developed is keeping pastures in phase 2, as is desired, achieving solid and even utilisation in the smaller paddocks, but less so in the larger paddocks for obvious reasons. The pasture in Callide/Front paddocks were good examples of the former and the Parra grass in Scrub paddocks a good example of the latter.

Recommendations

Note: If you plan on committing to a registered carbon project then we recommend applying the recommendations in below AFTER project registration.

Take your time to develop confidence in rotation of livestock, we actually want to limit the implementation of any significant change prior to a Carbon Project registration and baselining.

Grazing & Livestock

Explore the benefits of treating Bullock as a dedicated cell, grazed by older cattle, eg trade cows, whilst it is in development and incrementally improving as a result of improvements to grazing rotation/impact

Explore the benefits of splitting the Steer portion into a Leader / Follower style of grazing in order to mitigate the shortfalls in feed quality. The lead group would continue to do well on current feed at low density with high selectivity in feed on offer, whilst larger follower mobs would then continue to work on meeting goals for animal impact on high feed levels.

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Land Health

Production Zones

Assessment (Topsoil)

Assessments

Zone 1

Zone 2

Zone 3

Zone 4

Zone 5

Front

Jacks West / Cane areas

Callide East

Scub Pdks

Texas | Bullock

Soil Type & Observations

Better structured light clay loam

Denser structure of an ex-cultivation block, good quality

Noticably more anaerobic, sour smell from waterlogging

Heavier clay, some anaerobic waterlogging typical in wetlands

Medium clay, undulating tidal wetland

Water Infiltration

Target = 25+mm/hr

200mm/hr

150mm/hr

100mm/hr

300mm/hr

200-600mm/hr

Bulk Density

1.0

1.3

1.1

1.0

Soil Penetrometer

Target < 300 psi

Pasture Type & Observations

Current growth rates of 1.25 SDH/day calculated in field

Better drained, more elevated, stronger pasture mix/diversity

Poorer looking quality feed, sour from waterlogging

100% thick Parramatta grass, needs legume introduction

Tully grass dominant spp, some Stylo, Rhodes, Centro, Mekong grass

Groundcover (%)

Target = 90%+

100%

95%

100% & thick litter layer thatch to breakdown

100% Thick litter layer & thatch to breakdown

Species Diversity

Legumes:

Siratro (Macroptilium atropurpureum)

Stylo (Stylosanthes hamata)

Centro (Centrosema)

Grasses: Rhodes, Pangola (Digitaria), Tully (Urochloa)

Centro, Siratro Mekong (Brachiaria) grass

Rhodes, Pangola dominant, some Tully grass

Minimal diversity, Parra grass dominant

Good diversity, legume (Centro) increasing

Dominant Species

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Lab Analysis Overview

Soils

See “Soil Analysis Results” for full detail. The focus here is a high level summary of what will affect production and potential for SOC gains.

Focus

Zone 1

Zone 2

Zone 3

Zone 4

Zone 5

Front

Jacks West

Callide East

Scrub paddocks

Bullock area

Topsoil 0-30cm

The best of the samples

Low Calcium, high Magnesium & Sodium

Subsoil 30-50cm

Better than the topsoil, indicating is just a good deep, uniform soil of high potential

Very high sodium constraint (ESP 18%)

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Soil Input Recommendations

Soil

Zone

Goal

Input

Comments

Timing

Priority

Zone 1

High

Medium

Zone 2

High

Medium

Zone 3

All

Supplementation

Short term

High

Selenium

If not already part of induction Selenium definitely needs reviewing

High

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Estimate of Management Interventions Costs

Zone

Approx Area (Ha)

Intervention

Est. $/ha

Later

Total 10 Yrs

Comments

1. Front

Water/Wire

$80

$6,800

only 80ha needs dev

200

Soil inputs

$210

$105

$42,000

millmud/fine lime/gypsum mix to raise 2 dse/ha/yr

200

Pasture

let succession play out

2. Callide / Scrub

380

Water/Wire

$200

$100

100

$60,000

380

Soil inputs

$210

$105

$79,800

millmud/fine lime/gypsum mix to raise 2 dse/ha/yr

380

Pasture

$100

$38,000

$100/ha seed budgeted for legume

3. Texas / Bullock

350

Water/Wire

$200

100

$60,000

get stuck into large chunk w $150/ha dev for Cows asap

350

Soil inputs

$105

$36,750

budet 10ppm P over 10yrs to raise SR > 25%

350

Pasture

$100

100

$35,000

once dev in place $50/ha for seed spread legume

Total

$120,900

$87,800

$35,000

$114,650

$358,350

$385/ha over 10yrs?

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Natural Capital Monetisation

Carbon Estimation Areas (CEA’s)

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The average of estimated SOC gains, weighted to Area, are further modelled in below, with the following comments:

Break-even rate required means the annual rate of increase in SOC% to cover all estimated Carbon project costs, including 6 x sample events, 3 x audits, ACCU commission, government discounts and administration

The Lower Bound is the weighted average of various in-house modelling tools used to provide a conservative estimate of estimated SOC% gains where the intended management interventions of grazing and soil management are achieved

The Upper Bound is the estimate of SOC% gains we believe are possible based on comparable farms with comparable management intervention outcomes

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