This is the story of Brent Lashford’s change to regenerative grazing, starting in 2000.

Brent bought his property in the Machine Creek area, behind Mt. Larcom, QLD, 25 years ago, after searching for 18 months. That included getting to know and learning from people like Peter Andrews and others who have pioneered natural approaches to landscape and farm management.

By adopting their approach, he was the last to experience the drought and the first to emerge from it this year. His paddocks recovered instantly when it finally rained. The 400-acre property is subdivided into 27 paddocks.

Over the years, starting in 1998/9, Brent ripped each paddock once to break the plough pans. He used a D6 and specially adapted tines that shatter the plough pan with little disturbance of the vegetation. The ripping was done on the contour, using a laser level with toilet paper as markers to guide the driver. This spreads the water as well as breaking the plough pans and thus enables much faster drainage of surface water. As a result, runoff from his property is significantly reduced, as he keeps most of the rain where it falls.

The local Landcare group views the results of working with nature, rather than against it. He built dams in each paddock where that was practical and installed watering points in the other paddocks. He also built weirs in gullies to hold back more runoff water, allowing it to seep sideways into the adjacent soils. He also aims to increase pasture diversity, ideally with 20 –40 different grass, legume, and other species.

He seeds additional species with a disc planter. In wet area,s he planted Pangola grass through runners, as this grass has no fertile seed. Having enough diversity meant that when his bluegrass suffered from dieback, the pasture as a whole did not decline as other species took over.

Brent fattens only steers, which means he can adjust stocking rates a bit more easily than with breeding animals. The stock is rotated through many paddocks and stays in one paddock for a limited time. Thus, the pastures are being cropped, rather than grazed into the ground. That means that each plant can recover far quicker and also has more time to put more carbon into the soil.

Nature has been capturing and storing carbon through plants for billions of years, doing it for free. The carrying capacity of his property has steadily increased over the years. He can now carry up to 90 steers. When he bought the place, it could only carry about 30.

A walk through the paddocks demonstrated the results of working with nature, rather than against it.

Thank you, Brent, for your talk and the walk around your sheds and paddocks. Peter & Brent