Specifics of Growing in Australia

twenty47red-i said:

A new moon is a good time for germing seeds mate

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PESTS & PROBLEMS

When growing pot there are literally one thousand and one things that will go wrong in the season. Nasty little critters are a big proportion of that. This is a list of the more common pests and problems that I have encountered in the bush.


Kangaroos

The worst offender would have to be kangaroos. They eat the baby leaves, which stops the plants from growing. Last season the kangaroos and wallabies cost me about $50,000 in losses. There is only one way to deal with these bastards: leave some dead meat throughout the patch. Roos are herbivores, so the rotting meat keeps them away; blood and bone sometimes works, but every time it rains you have to put it out again. Usually what you have to do is shoot a roo and stake it to the ground in the patch. The problem then is that it attracts the goannas, six foot long lizards that are fierce meat-eaters, and dangerous. Goannas fight over the carcass, and flatten the pot plants, so it is a bit of a catch-22 situation. I've got a scar from a vicious bite from a goanna; bled for hours! I ended up just leaving an 'offering patch' for the kangaroos, isolating them in one area. Hurts a bit to do so; but alas, they were there first.


Parrots

Parrots are an unlikely pest, but they are terrible. They will not bother you if you have managed to keep the crop sensimilla, but if there is just one plant with just one seed in it, they will find it and strip that plant back to the stalk looking for more seeds, and once that's finished they will systematically move through the plantation looking for more. It makes you cry to get into the patch and watch 40-50 birds alight from the crop, and see colas and buds scattered all over the ground.


Frogs

Cute little frogs really pull in the snakes, so although they don't directly attack you they certainly attract their fair share of trouble underfoot.


Snakes

The snakes can catch you unawares sometimes. They get into the patch looking for all those juicy frogs, hoppers, birds and other snake prey, so you can accidentally stand on a Death Adder while quietly doing your own thing. Death Adders wiggle their tail to attract birds, and they don't move until the bird actually touches them, then – wham! – they strike, up to eight times a second. So, as you walk around always look where you are going! They're not quite as bad as Funnel Web Spiders, but in the end, you are just as dead.


Pigs

The pigs are the most destructive animal. Pigs root up the soil to get to the moisture under the plants; they go looking for the bugs in the soil, and they are so strong that they pull everything down. Once downed, the plants are eaten for good measure! Those pigs are aggressive too; if you disturb them there is actually a good chance they will turn on you. The only solution is to lay dog traps or use the trusty 12-gauge. Shotguns are not discreet however, and the gun sound echoes over a wide area, which can bring unwanted attention.


Pig Hunters

Known as 'piggers', these tough fellows are pulling in good money for wild pig. They send them off to Germany, as there is no more wild boar there and our pigs are boar descendants. If you leave the area for a while, quite often you can find that the piggers have been illegally hunting on the property. You see them at night with their spotlights on, and driving wildly all over the place, shots occasionally ringing out; they are a rough lot – death is a way of life for them, and they don't think twice about it.



Goats

Where there are pigs, there are goats. These buggers are not nearly as aggressive as the pigs, but just as destructive. They want the soft shoots at the top of the plants, so they trample them down. To stop the goats you must put up a heavy-duty fence, or stake a dead dog to the bush nearby. Both have problems, but I have found the dog solution works better. However, you've got to check that the pigs haven't eaten the bloody dog.




Professional Pot Hunters

Come April every year, heaps of guys hit the forest trails looking for patches to rob. These guys are there for one thing and that is your pot. They are always armed, and they shoot. The best way to avoid these guys is to not leave tracks. This problem can be minimized using proper stealth and security. Rippers are lazy and are only looking for a quick buck, so do your job properly and you will have nothing to worry about. Never grow within a kilometre of any road; always walk a different route; never mark trees; and at all times be quiet.



Funnel Web Spiders

Funnel web spiders are not really a threat to the crop, but if they bite you, they can certainly threaten your wellbeing – I guess it takes around 40 minutes, and you end up stone cold dead! Considering that the walk to the nearest road on a good day can take an hour, and the drive to the nearest hospital is 3 hours, you really want to keep these little critters away. Funnel Web Spiders like living in the roots of the plants, so you have to be careful when pulling those males out.



Police Helicopters

These guys are by far the biggest pests to come from the air, and when they land they take the whole lot! Fortunately they can be a little predictable. They are a bit lazy which is good for the rest of us. They stick to the spots where they have made a kill before, so DO NOT GROW IN AREAS WHERE POT IS KNOWN TO BE GROWN. Get as far away from the traditional places as possible, don't look like a pot grower, get a story, and look the part.



Walking

At first it seems all ok, but as time goes by, you begin to realize that if you actually slip over and twist your ankle, or put your back out, then you are in very serious trouble, especially if you have a 40kg bag of fertilizer on your back. You soon learn to walk by watching exactly where you put your feet. You do not take stupid risks like jumping onto rocks or over logs and you never, EVER run in the bush.



Grasshoppers

These bastards have the most appropriate name of all the pests. They hop from plant to plant nipping the tips, very effectively stunting growth. In turn, hoppers attract the birds that feed on them. Little birds are ok; but the hoppers can get quite big, so the larger birds like the currawongs and magpies attack, breaking the delicate plant tips even more.



Termites

Termites are the hidden fucker; they will creep into the plants and tunnel right up through the stalk. Pot is such a quick growing plant you never know that it is infested until it is too late. Telltale signs of termites are a yellowing of the leaves when all the rest of the crop is fine, or plants will suddenly become wilted. Often the first sign is that a plant is laying on the ground when a breeze knocks it over, and you notice it was holding on just by one little root.

You can lay insecticide to kill the little buggers, but it tends to kill the beneficial insects funnel web spider too. When sweating in the very hot sun every day, and breathing heavily, I don't trust the chemicals on my skin or in my lungs. Also, I'm not really a sentimental person, but there are a variety of endangered species in this area, and if they feed on insect sites laced with chemicals, they too will perish. I am not a big fan of using chemicals on the plants, so I just let them be. At the end of the day it is just a few out of the lot, but combined they can add up!



Storms and Trees

I have had some of my scariest experiences during the summer storms. The humidity is 90% for days on end. The heat is 35-40 degrees Celsius (over 100 degrees F) for weeks on end. Then the storms roll in. If it is a bad storm there will be hail. That's fortunately only once or twice a season, but what you will get are really strong winds, which drop trees and branches everywhere. Then you get the lightning; that is scary, and virtually every tree has lightning scars. Often you find bits of wood that have exploded from the trees after a lightning strike!



Caterpillars

A mate of mine explained how one day he was in his patch with his girlfriend, when this big group of butterflies flew about them. She said, "Oh look at the beautiful butterflies!" He told me that that was the end of the patch as far as he was concerned. She didn't understand until three weeks later, when they found dozens of the colas dead; the "beautiful" butterflies had been caterpillars, and ringbarked the buds, killing them!



Mold

When the wet weather sets in the mold will appear; if there has been an attack of the caterpillars you will find a large amount of mold in the buds. It appears where they have eaten and killed the bud. It also appears where they have shat, since manure is the perfect place for the mold to grow on. Once it starts to spread in the wet weather it can rapidly consume the whole bud!

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The major issues confronting agriculture today are increasing soil acidity, salinity and the reduction of organic matter. Australian soil scientist, Mel Lynch, refers to the end result as “Ground Zero!”

Mel says, "the continuing application of high analysis chemical fertiliser is systematically and rapidly acidifying our soils, reducing the soil’s ability to produce crops of consistently high quality in a sustainable, cost-effective manner."

Mel has conducted extensive trials across Australia – often to highly sceptical farmers – and has conclusively demonstrated the outstanding benefits of using mineral-based, as opposed to high analysis chemical fertiliser, on soils. “The application of mineral-based fertiliser will dramatically increase productivity, improve nutritional value, flavour and extend the shelf life of produce,” says Mel.

WHAT IS THE PROBLEM?
"There has been a serious decrease in soil pH which means a dramatic increase in acidity over the past two decades," says Mel.

"I'm conducting trials on farms almost everyday and the shifting tide towards increased soil acidity is adversely impacting upon the farmer’s bottom line and seriously decreasing the quality of produce. About 92% of Australian soil suffers from mineral deficiency!”

Soil acidity increases as pH declines over time. Data from Australian farmers nation-wide shows the trend of decreasing pH and increasing soil acidity over the past 20 years. In 1980 a pH of 5.85 was considered “normal” but in 2000 a value of 4.9 was considered “normal” but not ideal.

“When pH falls below 5.6 the acidification becomes significant and yield-limiting,” Mel points out.

The CSIRO and a number of universities have conducted studies revealing the extent of this problem. (CSIRO Media Release - Ref 98/38 - Feb 19, 1998; CSIRO Technical Report No 17/97)

“The CSIRO has determined that over $10 billion of phosphorus fertiliser is locked up in Australian soils because of soil acidification. $10 billion of phosphorus, which under current modern technology cannot be accessed! However there is a way of tapping into this enormous phosphorus reserve and thereby reducing input costs!”

Mel states emphatically, “Just because a fertiliser label reads 18-23-0 it doesn’t mean that the crop receives that quantity!”

CSIRO research, commercial trials and tests have shown that due to acidic soils, 85% of any phosphorus applied in the form of fertiliser such as single super, is locked up and inaccessible to any crop or pasture. To overcome this problem the application of lime is essential, on average 2 – 3 tonnes/ha to try and increase soil pH.

"85% lock-up! This is due to toxic levels of aluminium being released at low soil pH and this is then free to react with and bind-up the freshly applied phosphorus fertiliser."

HOW TO ADDRESS THE PROBLEM
The use of mineral fertilisers enables you to unlock and access this bound-up phosphorus and this equates to considerable savings.

"The best solution to this problem is to use silicate-based mineral fertiliser. This puts minerals, trace elements and Rare Earth Elements (REE) back into the soil. It will remineralise the depleted soil and re-invigorate soil vitality,” says Mel.

Silicate based mineral fertiliser is coated with microbes. And unlike chemical fertiliser, mineral fertiliser dramatically increases productivity, digestibility, palatability and nutritional value of plants and plant products.

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