Harvesters are humming in the paddocks as the sorghum harvest continues in the Gunnedah region.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Breeza Plains farmer Andrew Pursehouse had 350 hectares planted on Breeza Station this year, with harvest finishing on Saturday.
About two-thirds of the way through the harvest, work had to stop because of rain over the Breeza Plains and Caroona.
“We had a break because of the big rain last weekend - 60-90mm,” he said.
Sorghum must be harvested at certain times to protect it from the elements.
“It has to be under 13.5 per cent moisture just so it can safely store and won’t go mouldy. And it will probably be exported to meet specific standards,” he said.
“We budget on 4.5 tonnes per hectare and we harvested just a touch over that.”
The crop just scraped over the line to be labelled sorghum one.
“We were very fortunate our sorghum is border line,” Mr Pursehouse said.
“It has be 71 grams per hectolitre in weight and ours was 71-72 and if you fall under that, the dockage to sorghum two is about $40 per tonne. We’re fortunate our black soils had lots of subsoil moisture and that helped fill the grain.
“I think the important thing is it would have had the potential for eight tonnes per hectare if we hadn’t had the heatwave and the extreme summer.”
Mr Pursehouse said two-thirds of the harvest went straight to GrainCorp’s silos in Werris Creek and will eventually be exported out of Newcastle.
“Most of the sorghum seems to be going that way this year because the price is much better and the domestic users have plenty of white grains to use and they use that in preference,” he said.
“At the moment sorghum is worth more than wheat and barley, which is very unusual. There’s a lot of wheat and barley from the big harvest.”
Corn is also fresh off the paddock, with workers working through the night to finish in the “wee hours” of Monday morning in case of rain.
Mr Pursehouse said he had two types of corn planted – feed corn and processing corn.
“There’s a feed corn which basically finds its way to dairy farms, and we have processing corn which will go to corn flakes and corn chips,” he said.
On the 4500 hectares of Breeza Station, the cropping will continue, with faba beans and chick peas to be sown in the standing sorghum stubble in May. Towards the end of May, cotton will be harvested.
“A lot of the area needs more rain but at the moment it’s quite good. We’ve got good conditions for pasture growth for cattle. It’s damp and it’s still warm,” Mr Pursehouse said.
“We definitely need some more moisture in the profile. We’ve got plenty of time. The wheat won’t get sown until June.”
Some sorghum crops are yet to be harvested at Nea, on the Breeza Plains and around Werris Creek.
Related story: Harvest approaches
