Native Grasses - LANDLINE

A vigneron in South Australia is planting native grasses instead of European ones between his grape vines to help deal with drought and bush fires. He's enlisted the help of ecologist Andrew Fairney, who's invented a revolutionary machine that makes sowing large-scale native grasslands possible - for the first time ever!

[@marschlosser4540]

It's weird, isn't it, that anything from Europe is always preferred over native. In Arizona, there's a lot of native species that depend on fire, slow 'cool' fires to thrive. Cypress is one. manzanita, native clover, juniper, and so on. We get wet years that make everything grow well, only to die back when these little droughts hit. Then we get mega fires, and yes, the worse is exotics. Well done and I hope the government will finally help.

[@matjohn443]

It’s because farmers always pass down from family to family which Is fair but different climate and different environment to Europe means we can’t use the same techniques and needs to move towards natural sequence farming and native plants being introduced back into the area because as it’s not just best for farming in Australia it’s better for native animals

[@buddhababeoz]

Very inspiring... Shame it's not more well known. Although things are changing due to our climate pressures.

[@travispix2121]

the aim of agriculture is to maximise the yield per acre... if it's a livestock property they need the increased amount of feed to maintain higher stocking rates..
if they all went native grasses the costs would be 10x and not viable!

[@chucktaylor4958]

In Texas, African species were the grasses of choice. There are even African game species on some ranches.

[@pawanjindal4286]

great job

[@LureThosePixels]

Wonderful that theyre off grid too!

[@benwilliams3539]

these grasses any good as pasture for animals?

[@travispix2121]

the native seed cost is astronomically high compared to other pasture seeds.
native pasture seed blend recommended rate 15-20kgs/ha @$140kg
perennial rye grass recommended rate 18-20kgs/ha @$4.50kg..
no farmer could ever afford to do a sown native pasture on a large scale. (my wife wanted to do 2 paddocks for horses until we looked into the actual costs and then it was quickly abandoned)

[@buddhababeoz]

@@travispix2121 This is a topic that needs to be brought to our government Landcare programs for funding. The Landcare regeneration farming practices have a tax incentive. This approach needs more attention and could change the devastation caused by wildfires. It just needs more people to get behind it.

[@ynocoolnamesleft]

That lady doesn't know what she's talking about charcoal isn't a high nutrient source