Keynote speaker Alan Parker presenting at Padua Park.

Graziers from all over eastern Australia headed home with a positive mindset and new ideas after the third regenerative rangelands conference near Cunnamulla last week.

126 people attended the 3rd regenerative rangelands conference at Padua Park, a property owned by SLM (Sustainable Land Management) Partners, last Thursday and Friday.

After last year’s success at La Trobe Station near Longreach, the SLM team put their hand up to host this year’s conference.

Carol Godfrey of Tinnenburra station, Sandy Browne and Ian Feather of Garrawin station, co founder of LSS and KLR marketing Jim Lindsay and ACC manager Grant Keane catching up between presentations on Friday morning.

General manager Graham Finlayson opened the conference with a summary of SLM’s story since buying properties between Bourke and Cunnamulla 11 years ago, and the ups and downs through operating the business since then.

All the properties have been substantially developed with 539km of poly pipe laid and more than 4000 kilometres of fences put in, allowing the company to run a holistic planned grazing business that is profitable.

“I believe disconnection to the land is a far greater challenge to the rangelands than drought,” Mr Finlayson said.

“The importance of seeing people, land and business as a whole was the core focus of the two-day conference. People from as far away as Sydney, Wentworth, Rockhampton and the Channel country listened to a wide range of speakers from various parts of the agricultural industry who covered these topics well.”

There was plenty of time for discussion and networking in between presentation. Left to right: Kate Usmar (partly), Maidie Dawson of Woomanooka, Luke Cominski of Wellington, James Barnett of Orange, David McLean from RCS and Ewan Crook.

Co-founder of LSS and KLR Marketing, Jim Lindsay, pointed out the importance of observing your landscape and animals. He has noted through his 30 years of travels across Australia that despite a large amount of water and wire infrastructure put up, the management has not improved.

“The most important thing a livestock farmer or pastoralist need to learn is feed budgeting your grass. In every grazing system, things will fall into place when you budget your feed. Droughts don’t bother me at all, I focus on what I have and work with that,” Mr Lindsay told the audience.

Lauren Beresford of Farnham Plains near Eulo also spoke at the conference, presenting a talk she prepared as part of her participation in the Lachlan Hughes Foundation program. The program supports and develops young people on their regenerative agriculture learning journey.

“This conference is a great place to meet like minded people, develop yourself and learn from others. It’s fantastic being part of such a community,” she said.

Padua Parks and SLMs operations manager Dustin Clinch and Nature’s Equity’s Dick Richardson during Friday afternoons paddock tour.

Anthony Glasson of Thargomindah, attended the conference with his two children Janica and Kain, commenting that that range of quality speakers made it well worth the trip.

Pictures from the Glasson’s Picarilli station were shown in Glenn Landsberg’s presentation explaining landscape hydrology. Through his job in NRM, Landsberg is working to slow the water down to increase plant growth and regenerate the landscape, which sequesters carbon, which again increases water holding capacity.

In very dry times, research shows you can lose up to 90 percent of the rain to run off from your paddocks in a rain event, and that is not much rain to grow plants from, Mr Landsberg said.

Through his work mechanically forming spreader banks, the water will slow down enough to improve water infiltration in this area. He also highlighted the importance of good grazing management to succeed.

“There is no point carrying out this sort of work if you don’t manage your grazing to let plants grow and develop good root systems,” Mr Landsberg said.

The future of the rangelands is in good hands with these young boys leading the way. Left to right: Beau Gallegos, Mitchell Whyte, Cody Dougmore, Steven Sieg, Joshua Williams and Michael Allen.

Changing their grazing management is something Simon and Laura Prince of Geandale station have done in the last two years. The young Cobar couple recently finished a two year Soils and Landscape project managed and facilitated by RCS through the Future Drought fund. Through learning and coaching they’ve seen positive outcomes on their property and are improving their soils. Attending the conference added to the young couple’s knowledge.

“You don’t do a trade without being trained, so why should agriculture be any different,” Mr Prince said.

Evonne Haycock travelled from Cawnalmurtee Station near White Cliffs to the event. Managing a 400 000 acres merino operation for Paroo Pastoral Company, she said she found the conference well worth attending.

“The speakers’ willingness to share their stories, success and failures are very important and valuable to others”, she said.

David McLean from RSC presenting at the conference.

Dr Judi Earl is one of Australia’s leading grazing specialists and has followed the transition of the SLM properties since 2014, through 36 different monitoring sites across the properties. Although only on a small part of the properties, the positive trend is clear with a large increase in plant cover and diversity, while bare ground is decreasing.

“The regeneration capacity of the land in the western division is phenomenal. When SLM can show these results from only three good years out of ten, the potential for regeneration is enormous,” she said in her presentation.

Keynote speaker Allan Parker is a well known micro behavioural neuro scientist who works as a negotiator and forensic linguist across the world.  Mr Parker has previously worked within the European Union, United Nations and companies like Microsoft.

What brings a busy and in demand negotiator out to the Australian bush for a rangelands conference?

“The human body is screaming out for nutrient rich food, which people in the rangelands can produce with a positive impact. I would like to start a global trend that will increase the lifespan of human beings. I can’t think of anything more important than that,” Mr Parker said after the conference.

A 10mm rain event Wednesday night made it interesting for the few attendees arriving Thursday morning, however despite that, the event was a success. All attendees and speakers camped on site, creating a good place of connection and networking between the conference program. A Friday afternoon paddock tour looking at cattle and native pasture recovery after grazing, rounded off the two days well.

SLM Partners Australia owns five property clusters between Bourke and Cunnamulla: Karalee, Amenda, Padua Park, Willacora and Garrawin covering 284,924 hectares in total.

22 people are currently employed between these properties, as well as their families. Development work has included 1100 new paddocks and 150 new water points with 4000 kms of fencing, mostly single wire fences.

Source: SLM Partners