Nick KellyNick farms near Newdegate in WA, 375km SE of Perth with his wife, Lucy, and his parents, Malcolm and Cathie. The Kellys are broadacre minimum-till/ no-till croppers. They have experimented with tropical grasses and broadleaf summer cover crops for more than ten years.
The Kelly family initially began growing millet and progressed to cocktails of millet, cowpeas, lab lab and sunflowers. Their weather resilient farming system' is enhancing soil health, sequestering carbon, reducing erosion, increasing moisture retention, reducing chemical use and improving crop yields. In 2014 the Kelly's introduced biological fertilisers to their cropping program. |
The Kelly Family
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Excerpt from South West Catchments Council, WA article...
NICK KELLY is busy building a huge workforce at his Newdegate farm. But unlike most labour sources, this one just works for food and shelter. The workforce is the millions of soil micro-organisms and other soil life that live below ground. Typically an unrecognised farm resource, soil biology can do some heavy lifting, such as improving soil structure and suppressing disease.
One of the key tools that Nick uses to support this workforce is cover cropping. Cover crop residues provide an energy source for soil biology, and also serve other purposes, such as nutrient capture and controlling weeds.
Nick first got involved with cover crops to control wild radish and ryegrass on his 3,000 hectares of cropping country. The weeds had become a major issue, and his rigorous spray program only seemed to result in herbicide resistance. With the weed-seed bank appearing to be unbreakable, Nick started to look at an integrated approach that included increasing competition for weeds with cover crops.
The search for more information on cover cropping introduced him to American growers like Dwayne Beck, and more recently Rick Bieber, who argues that cover cropping is a key tool for improving soil, leading to better use of rainfall and lower cost of production. It’s an argument that attracted Nick, who was soon adhering to the principles of zero tillage, maintaining total soil cover, growing plants all year round and maximising plant diversity to build soil carbon and support soil biology.
One of the keys to increasing soil carbon is having plants growing for more months of the year. Summer cover crops could be a vital link to achieve this, so one of Nick’s first goals was to find out which species could best survive a Mediterranean summer.
The first crop recommended to Nick was White French Millet due to its water use efficiency and root bulb. After using it as a monoculture, Nick trialled the millet in a mix with other summer crops and found that survival seemed to improve. He is currently combining the millet with sunflowers, lablab and cowpeas. Results can vary with soil type, with Nick’s soils varying from clays to sandy gravels.
NICK KELLY is busy building a huge workforce at his Newdegate farm. But unlike most labour sources, this one just works for food and shelter. The workforce is the millions of soil micro-organisms and other soil life that live below ground. Typically an unrecognised farm resource, soil biology can do some heavy lifting, such as improving soil structure and suppressing disease.
One of the key tools that Nick uses to support this workforce is cover cropping. Cover crop residues provide an energy source for soil biology, and also serve other purposes, such as nutrient capture and controlling weeds.
Nick first got involved with cover crops to control wild radish and ryegrass on his 3,000 hectares of cropping country. The weeds had become a major issue, and his rigorous spray program only seemed to result in herbicide resistance. With the weed-seed bank appearing to be unbreakable, Nick started to look at an integrated approach that included increasing competition for weeds with cover crops.
The search for more information on cover cropping introduced him to American growers like Dwayne Beck, and more recently Rick Bieber, who argues that cover cropping is a key tool for improving soil, leading to better use of rainfall and lower cost of production. It’s an argument that attracted Nick, who was soon adhering to the principles of zero tillage, maintaining total soil cover, growing plants all year round and maximising plant diversity to build soil carbon and support soil biology.
One of the keys to increasing soil carbon is having plants growing for more months of the year. Summer cover crops could be a vital link to achieve this, so one of Nick’s first goals was to find out which species could best survive a Mediterranean summer.
The first crop recommended to Nick was White French Millet due to its water use efficiency and root bulb. After using it as a monoculture, Nick trialled the millet in a mix with other summer crops and found that survival seemed to improve. He is currently combining the millet with sunflowers, lablab and cowpeas. Results can vary with soil type, with Nick’s soils varying from clays to sandy gravels.
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Nick is also using winter cover crop mixes like wheat, barley, oats, cereal rye, lupins, canola, peas, vetch and clover. And some of these like lupins can even be grown in summer beneath a canopy of millet.
Nick says there are no silver bullets, and learning what you can and can’t get away with can be risky and expensive. But now, the reduction in input costs means that farm risk is easier to manage. And it appears there are other forms of risk mitigation occurring. Compared to his neighbours, Nick says he may have less impact from frost in spring and erosion during summer storms. Nick warns against going “cold turkey” or trying to change everything in one year, but also says that you will never know unless you push your boundaries. He admits that the transition saw a decline in yield and some pretty tough times that needed a fair bit of resolve to get through. But now the system is more profitable, primarily off the back of reduced input costs and a lower cost of production. Thanks to Nick and WIG (www.WIG.farm) for helping with this article. |
Nick addressing a group at a WIG (Wheatbelt Integrity Group) Field Day in 2017.
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Media
'Realising the potential of soil with cover cropping and other practices'
South West Catchments Council, Western Australia
'Switch to biological farming expected to bring significant savings and keep growers on the land'
ABC Rural News
'Realising the potential of soil with cover cropping and other practices'
South West Catchments Council, Western Australia
'Switch to biological farming expected to bring significant savings and keep growers on the land'
ABC Rural News
Wheatbelt Integrity Group, WA
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Nick Kelly is Chairman of the Wheatbelt Integrity Group, a farmer organisation in WA addressing the reducing number of Wheatbelt farmers due to debt. They raise awareness of the high suicide rate in regional areas and promote the transition from a chemical farming system to a biological one. By promoting sustainable farming and sharing knowledge, Wheatbelt Integrity Group hopes to restore the Wheatbelt farming industry.
Read more on the WIG website where you will find contact details for the group. |
