Track 2-09: Soil Quality, Biology and Plant-Soil Interactions
Description
The extensive tropical grasslands of north Queensland are grazed by beef cattle and provide a significant proportion of the water flowing into the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) lagoon. Soil sediments and nutrients eroding from the grazing lands of the Burdekin and Fitzroy catchments in north-east Queensland contributes to reduced water quality in the GBR lagoon. Degraded and eroded D-condition bare areas and eroding gullies in grazing lands provide a disproportionate amount of soil and nutrient losses from predominately native pasture grasslands used for cattle grazing. Rehabilitating these degraded areas will help improve water quality flowing onto the reef.
Rehabilitation methods were evaluated on three soil types on a degraded creek frontage in the Burdekin River catchment of north Queensland over the 2011-2012 summer. These bare patches occur widely across the two catchments and consistently degraded sites have been identified by 24 years of satellite imagery. The objectives of this study were to identify mechanical methods and management practices for regenerating these bare patches. This will assist landholders in returning unproductive land into useful grazing pastures and will provide benefits to the wider community by improving water quality from grazing lands that enters the GBR lagoon.
Citation
Hall, Trevor J., "Rehabilitating Degraded Frontage Soils in Tropical North Queensland" (2020). IGC Proceedings (1993-2023). 12.
https://uknowledge.uky.edu/igc/22/2-9/12
Included in
Rehabilitating Degraded Frontage Soils in Tropical North Queensland
The extensive tropical grasslands of north Queensland are grazed by beef cattle and provide a significant proportion of the water flowing into the Great Barrier Reef (GBR) lagoon. Soil sediments and nutrients eroding from the grazing lands of the Burdekin and Fitzroy catchments in north-east Queensland contributes to reduced water quality in the GBR lagoon. Degraded and eroded D-condition bare areas and eroding gullies in grazing lands provide a disproportionate amount of soil and nutrient losses from predominately native pasture grasslands used for cattle grazing. Rehabilitating these degraded areas will help improve water quality flowing onto the reef.
Rehabilitation methods were evaluated on three soil types on a degraded creek frontage in the Burdekin River catchment of north Queensland over the 2011-2012 summer. These bare patches occur widely across the two catchments and consistently degraded sites have been identified by 24 years of satellite imagery. The objectives of this study were to identify mechanical methods and management practices for regenerating these bare patches. This will assist landholders in returning unproductive land into useful grazing pastures and will provide benefits to the wider community by improving water quality from grazing lands that enters the GBR lagoon.
