Food from a heavy black soil
Description: Dry, crumbly, heavy black flat soil, self mulching clay
Location: flat paddock and backyard on northern Wimmera plains
Family Values/uses for this soil:
Family Farming – Home backyard orchard for our own food use
Commercial family-run farm enterprise – Broad acre cropping of cereals and legumes to local and global markets – Produce goes to feed the ‘world’
Challenges for this clay based soil:
A thirsty soil which produces well with moisture, but crops fail without adequate rain fall or watering.
It shrinks when it is dry and expands when it is wet, creating sinkholes and water lost to intended plants
Management to prevent sinkholes in the orchard:
A heavy layer of mulch (e.g. straw) helps to maintain a more even moisture level, which reduces cracking and water running down cracks and sink holes
See more
– about the Wimmera Soil types from this WRLA report
– about soil challenges and managements of more Wimmera farms growing food for their family and the world in these Batchica and Bangerang Soil Selfies and in LN post
-about growing a family farm on black clays in this Darling Downs Soil Selfies from Queensland
Credits : KP, of Jeparit gives permission for these photos and information to be used under a (cc) license 2015 Editing and page created by Jeanie Clark, enviroed4all®, Warracknabeal, for use in education under a (cc) licence 2015
page published 26 July 2015, updated 9 January 2016