Soil Biology in Dryland Cropping Explained

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]If you want to find people that know how to look after soil, go where the soil and the environment is fragile. Today I'm in South Australia, just off the Goer line, sitting on about 4 and a half thousand hectares of cropping land that the Schutz family are managing to improve their biology, reduce their input costs, and increase their yield.

[00:00:21]Last week, we caught up with Paul in the paddic to find out what impact it's having on soil structure. This week, we're jumping onto the tractor with Gary as he seeds the paddic to find out the unexpected benefits that this increase in soil biology and resilience is bringing to the farm.

[00:00:42]I'm Gary Schulz. I've been sort of driving the air probably 12 Yeah, 12 years I suppose.

[00:00:51]For a start, it was sort of just after school or getting days off school. And yeah, this pedal here was probably some of the first country that we started mucking around with different versions of yeah, biological farming, I guess.

[00:01:07]Um, we probably I was probably a bit young to remember how it all started, but this was some of the first ground we did cuz it had dramas. Um, hard setting, hungry red dirt. Um, it was probably four or 5 years into using what we sort of started with that we really noticed the difference when we bought the neighboring paddock alongside here. I remember the first year we sewed that We sewed this paddock first and then went into there and it was night and day difference just by how the bar pulled through the fence there. It was really dancing around on top of the ground and it's probably use an extra oh 10 to 15 L an hour of diesel just because of how hard pulling it was. um the guys who were farming that like really good farmers uh sort of got a bit of country in yeah more reliable areas and probably used a bit more of the western practice for their cropping program. Um, I think the biological sort of idea goes really well hand in hand together with that.

[00:02:20]And yeah, I think we're we're probably implementing a few more western practices, higher higher fertilizer rates. This paddock's probably a a bit of an exception. We sort of missed doing a knockdown trying to conserve moisture.

[00:02:32]Um, we still had sheep on this up until a week ago. Um, but yeah, that was probably a bit of a a trigger point. I wouldn't say we got this pedock up and rocking properly yet, but from where it's come from, it's exceptional. It's the corner here. Um, I think you don't want to you don't want to completely go away from your fertilizer that you're using. But the two hand in hand together with crop life um, sort of gives it that buffer, makes it a little bit kinder on the soil.

[00:03:06]Um, I think probably having sort of nine consecutive dry starts until this year.

[00:03:14]I think it's probably until this year that we've seen it, the soil alive when we start sewing rather than being dry and dead. I think if you're in an area where you traditionally do have a nice corn start, you'll you'll really see the results. You you'll see it probably more than we are here, I reckon, um, where it's more of a consistent soil moisture.

[00:03:35]If you can conserve your moisture, I don't see why the crop wild by life with nutritional practices can't bloody make your yields explode and your soil life explode. Grow a better product rather than something pumped up and jacked up.

[00:03:49]Have something with Yeah. bit more body to it. It's got to be better for the consumer in the long run. Uh chemical wise, our dirt probably doesn't quite stand up to higher rates. Like I guess you can't go against what the manufacturer says. You still got to stick to a label rate, but we're certainly not ones to go and pull buddy 2 L around up on everything every time you go over it. And same with your immies and incrop sprays. Um cuz we're sort of talking marginal rainfall especially you go fraction east here dirt just yeah it uh your crop doesn't bounce back the next year you have that residual hanging around if you don't get summer rain. So we got to be a little bit careful we don't create resistance um using a lighter rate being very mindful of what chemical we use in soil types lighter soils certainly cuz they can't stand up to it smothering your your biological activity in chemical well yeah it can't be good but you certainly we couldn't go fully organic it just would not work we we still need that chemical attribute to grow crops. Imagine trying to kill this sort of green with steel. We we'd need to be going over the pedock three or four times and that's probably just as bad as using ridiculous chemical rates.

[00:05:16]Um smashing the crap out of your dirt.

[00:05:19]It's Yeah, I think it's got to be a balance. Um probably taken a little bit to get my head around it. I guess you hang around with a lot of the western cockis and yeah, I use buddy a couple liters of this and a couple liters of that and it uh yeah, you have to take a step back and remember where we're farming and yeah, I think we're slowly getting our head around of a bit of a balance. Yeah, if we can make our soil biology work here and grow crops on 4 in of rain, uh 20 2018 we we grew Yeah, I wouldn't say it was a very good year at all. Um it started and it finished but we still grew some crops in yeah, very marginal conditions.

[00:06:10]2019 was sort of much the same. 2020 we didn't have a lot more rain. Um, but the soil activity was probably working a little bit more. It it uh was more of a shorter season. Like it kind of only started raining in July and it finished in September. But if we can grow a crop and get our soil biology working on four or five ines of rain, you can too.

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