Collated by Brian Ashton, Senior Livestock Consultant, Rural Solutions SA, Pt Lincoln
Rural Solutions SA, with funding from the Government's Drought Response and the EP Grain & Graze project, conducted "Coping with the season" workshops from late September 2006 to help people plan ahead. They also did a survey of people in high rainfall areas who containment-fed sheep as a drought management practice. In mid 2007 five groups obtained "Community support grants" to run "Drought review" meetings to discuss the outcomes and what they learnt. This report is a summary of what was learnt from these activities.
- While the financial cost was considerable, farmers generally did a really good job of looking after their land, pastures and stock. There was much less erosion than in previous droughts.
- Many people removed their sheep from vulnerable pastures and confinement fed them. They kept them in good condition and learnt that it's not difficult.
- People learnt a lot about feeding their stock, which will help them in other years.
- Cattle producers usually chose to feed the cattle in the paddocks. This also worked well although a few producers did not monitor their stock condition well enough and they should have been fed more.
This 14-page report contains key findings and recommendations and can be found at
www.ruralsolutions.sa.gov.au.