Northern Grazing demonstration project

The Northern Grazing demonstration project is engaging beef producers centred around demonstration sites on four grazing properties in the Upper Herbert, Upper Burdekin, Bowen Broken Bogie and Fitzroy. It reinforces the importance of good grazing management, based on the principles demonstrated by the long-term Wambiana Grazing Trial. The project is delivered by the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries and is funded through the Queensland Government’s Reef Water Quality Program in collaboration with the Northern Genomics Project from Queensland Alliance for Agriculture and Food Innovation at the University of Queensland.

Significant activities include:

  • demonstration sites established as examples to improve productivity, profitability and land condition health into the future
  • several field days held on grazing properties
  • new tools for producers including an easy to use stocking rate ready reckoner.

The project is also achieving significant social outcomes. At the field day at Ametdale in August 2019, the producers that attended ranked their increase in knowledge from 3.7 to 5.5 on a 7-point scale and indicated a score of 4.1 in terms of their likelihood to change the way they manage their herd and pasture as a result of attending the day. The rankings show the value of on-farm demonstrations to increase knowledge and change attitudes.