Workshop looks at how to look after land during the Dry

HIGHLY-respected grazing management consultant Brian Wehlburg spent a week in the BBB in mid-September visiting a number of properties to assist in grazing planning for the rest of the dry season and preparing for the wet season.

The visit was a joint initiative between NQ Dry Tropics’ Reef Trust Stomping out Sediment project and the LDC.

Brian provided local graziers with valuable insights and information including:

• Getting Animals to the ‘right place at the right time for the right reasons’.
• Innovative techniques to simultaneously maximise stocking rate and improve land health and productivity.
• How to use livestock to improve the health of your land and increase profit.
• How to coordinate three primary land management tools (rest, grazing, animal impact) to grow more pasture.

• How to maximise the harvest of sunlight by managing stocking rate, time, stock density and herd effect.
• How to make the best plan for the season ahead.
• How to meet your grazing and pasture production challenges effectively.

The week-long tour ended with a field trip to Tom and Karen Murphy’s Tabletop Station where Tom highlighted the importance of pasture recovery during the wet season.

Nearly all Tabletop paddocks receive at least four months of rest during the wet season to grow as much grass as possible to carry into the dry season.

Attendees also saw progress on a number of gully management projects which include a range of earthworks and grazing practices aimed at re-profiling suitable gullies using livestock.

Karen and Tom Murphy, Tabletop Station (photo by Melissa Cormack Photography)

Holistic Management trainer Brian Wehlburg

Brian Wehlburg is a well-regarded Holistic Management educator. Passionate about the environment from an early age, he attended an introductory course in 1995 and was bowled over with the results he obtained through managing holistically.

As a certified Holistic Management educator, Brian has shared his passion and knowledge with many businesses, land managers, families, environmental groups and pastoralists. Brian has trained and consulted in Australia, New Zealand, America and Zimbabwe.

He has hands-on experience in crop farming in Central Africa, working as a pasture and cattle manager in South West Queensland and managing a mixed-species property in New South Wales.

In 2016, Brian provided Holistic Management courses for Bowen, Collinsville and Charters Towers districts graziers and continues to work with many of those graziers.