Sowing Native Pastures

Sowing native pasture species is relatively new in Australia. Large-scale revegetation is prohibited by the cost of seed and/or the availability of species.

Added to this, issues of local provenance and seed quality are also important when using seed harvested from wild stands. Native species also tend to drop their seed over time thus increasing the chance of seed germinating under favourable climatic conditions.

This is an adaptive characteristic which may disadvantage domesticated cultivars under field conditions. A number of seed harvesting and sowing techniques have been developed to accommodate the adaptive ‘wild’ characteristics of native grass seed.

These techniques have been reviewed in detail in “Grassed up: guidelines for revegetating with Australian native grasses” (see References and Further Reading list).