Prioritising soil and vegetative health helps to ensure reduced runoff and that an operation’s most basic, yet vital asset – its soil – is not washed away. This is critical to improving the quality of the water that flows into the surrounding waterways.
Project Pioneer participants were taught to monitor soil health to gain line of sight over what lies beneath the ground’s surface by paying close attention to the behaviour of vegetation and measuring water quality.
Important factors in improving soil health include providing sufficient rest and developing robust root systems. These factors are at the heart of regenerative agriculture management.
A key measurement of soil health is water quality. This graph demonstrates the water quality in waterways on Project Pioneer participants’ properties verse those who are not practicing regenerative management.
Initial overland flow results for the 2019-2020 water quality surveys. These measurements were taken on three Project Pioneer properties in the Fitzroy catchment. The treatment properties have implemented RCS principles such as those adopted through Project Pioneer, while the control properties have not.
Rainfall run-off from a property managed under regenerative grazing principles (left) versus that of a neighbouring property that is not yet subject to regenerative land management.
Project Pioneer is funded by the partnership between the Australian Government’s Reef Trust and the Great Barrier Reef Foundation. The project is delivered by RCS with support from WWF, Maia Technology, Farm Map 4D and CQUniversity.