With the amount of land at risk to salinity increasing, the search is on for new perennial plants which will thrive in areas where lucerne struggles.

NSW DPI principal research scientist, Dr Brian Dear, who leads a Co-operative Research Centre program investigating new pasture plants, says the search has discovered a range of plants which look to have serious potential.

“The over-riding challenge for this work has been to find adaptable plant species which help control salinity, whilst also forming a component of productive and profitable livestock systems.”

Dr Dear says the project has already identified pasture plants for a range of niche environments where lucerne either performs poorly or does not suit particular farming systems.

In northern NSW and WA, subtropical grasses look to be the most valuable new recharge plant, outperforming more traditional cool season grasses in trials at Tamworth and Manilla on the north-west slopes of NSW.

However, an agronomy and economics package will need to be developed to give farmers the confidence to widely adopt the new species.

The summer growing herb, chicory, is showing to be the best alternative to lucerne in the cropping zones of NSW, Western Australia, Victoria and South Austraia and has untapped potential to breed drought and grazing tolerant cultivars.

Its drought tolerance, mild acid soil tolerance, palatability and production, coupled with relative ease of establishment and removal means it should play a much larger role in cropping rotations in the future.

Other new species with potential for the cropping zones and for permanent pastures include the brome and veldt grasses.

A range of drought tolerant, summer dormant cool season grasses for the national wheat belt such as cultivars of cocksfoot, phalaris and fescue have been identified, which should increase the adoption of perennial pastures.

Other research currently underway includes:

• evaluation of three new cultivars of lotus for the high rainfall areas,
• a new cultivar of strawberry clover for waterlogged discharge sites,
• selection of salt tolerant Melilotus messansisis,
• shrubs such as tagasaste and lotononis, and
• perennial medicago, cullen and onobychris for the low rainfall wheatbelt and permanent grazing zone.

Contact: Brian Dear on 02 6938 1999 or brian.dear@dpi.nsw.gov.au

This article is an extract from the CRC for Plant-based Management of Dryland Salinity’s Focus on Salt magazine, issue 34.

This story appears in Agriculture Today.