We had about 53 people come on our winter field walk this year. A good turn out considering the way the year has gone. Below are the photos that were taken on the walk and a brief description of what they're of. One sight missed out being photographed, that being the Case SDX30 Disc seeder at Richard Barrett's. The season being so late, there wasn't anything you could see and Interline had to let the bar go to the next dealer. If you want any information on the Case SDX30 Disc seeder, call into Interline Sales and ask Greg, Neil or Anton. I'm sure they'll be happy to fill you in on the details.

To get a larger image, click on the small picture and wait a couple of seconds(minutes?) It should be replaced with a bigger picture.

This was our first stop on the field walk, Ron William's feedlot. As you can the the yards/paddocks are surrounded by hay bales. This gives the sheep some protection aswell as helping the keep the contained. If they do happen to get spooked, there's little chance they can get though both the fence and bales.



Another view of the yards. There are 2 yards, with full length feed troughs at one end and the water point at the other

Looks like the smokers have to keep their distance!

The feed troughs are filled by Ron's seed/super bin. He's added a short piece of tube on the end so it's easier to fill the trough. Also the roof pivots up, so that hay, chaff etc can be dropped in by front end loader.

Here is the frame on the feed trough. Ron designed it so that it could be made out of 1 length of pipe without any wastage.

A better view of the feed trough. The roof pivots on thr right hand side.

Sheep. Need those in a feedlot.

Don't want to have to clean out the water trough ? Then use self watering nipples, as used in piggeries. Rob McMiles from McMiles Industries supplied the hardware and helped Ron to set it up.

The seconded site of the day. Barley trials on Steven Bolts. Wasn't alot that could be pickup up at the time, other than Steven had alot more rain than the rest of us. Trial should be good to look at in the Spring field walk.

2 farmers and an Ag Consultant.

Barley Trials.

This was porbably the most visual site of the day. Lupin seeding width trials on Wes & Meg Bakers. This trial is being run under our GRDC Funded Precision Farming Research Project. Go here for full trial details. This shows 92cm row spacing.

The man himself, Wes Baker.

46cm spacing on the left. 92cm rows on the right.

23cm spacings on the left. 46cm rows on the right.

After luch at the Bulyee hall , we moved onto Ivan Lee's. Here we're looking at the "snake chains" he has dragging behind his press wheels. The idea it to fluff the soil in the row to try and minimise moisture loss by capillary action.

Ivan Lee was one of the first farmers to use liquid nitrogen and here you can see the nozzle that squirts it out on a single stream ontop of the furrow.

Anyone know a good plumber ? Here you can see a double hose kit along with the liquid N plumbing.

Another shot of the sowing system.

Last site for the day was Jeff Edwards. Also a liquid N user. He places the N under the seed.

He used star harrows this year, with one section of press wheels. Jeff said he was impressed with the establishment of the press wheels and would probably change over to press wheels for next year.

Jeff's Flexi-Coil bar.

A close up of the nozzle. You can see it in the center of the picture.

Here's a shot of the nozzle in action. This is about the pressure that it works at.

Finally, Jeffs Liquid-N cart. Jeff made this himself. Not a bad effort!

I think considering the season at the time, it was a very successful field walk. We had 50 people attend the day and I'm sure they left with a few more things to think about.