We farm at Lake Grace, 320 kilometres south east of Perth in the Lakes district. Our property is around 3,000 ha, cropping 2,500 ha and running 1500 sheep and 50 cattle on the remaining 500 ha which is sown to clovers and biserrula. Our soils are mostly lake bank morrell and clay loams.
Ours is a family-run business. I work with my wife Janine and my son who has recently returned to the farm and is mainly the truck driver. We do employ a casual at harvest to drive the chaser bin. This makes day-to-day management fairly easy as we are all very hands-on.
This season started a little dry, unlike many areas in WA, but turned in July to be very good, especially with the lack of frosts and the mild finish. However, 2021 was our best year on record and this one will be second best. It seems that the two seasons are alternatively the ‘best ever’ depending on who you talk to, but never equal.
The cost of production has been a concern all year and the nitrogen rates could have been higher. There is a lot of ASW wheat going into CBH right now! We also had poor efficacy with the pre-emergent herbicides not getting enough rain to wash off the stubble and become active. We have a few more weeds than I would like.
We’re well over halfway through harvest and the yields of canola, barley and wheat have been very good.
For 2023, expansion is on the horizon. Whether that be farmland or an opportunity outside of agriculture is a good question and we’re open to both. Farmland is very expensive. The corporates are buying land and pushing prices up, making affordability difficult. We’ve had a couple of very good years so we have the reserves needed to make something happen. My son is keen to expand the farm so maybe that is the go.
We put a lot of our success to a grain marketing plan that works very well and a sound budgeting strategy. Fortunately, our budget situation has improved markedly from how it was tracking mid-year.
Our farm business is not facing any major issues or problems at the moment, though I think the current method that CBH uses to buy contracts isn’t working very well or fairly. Grain prices have been suppressed by the problem of getting grain from inland to port. Fixing that for the future is certainly important.
What are the chances of 2023 making it three in a row for the Watsons? That would be nice but the odds probably aren’t flash. Merry Christmas to all and our best wishes for a satisfactory conclusion to harvest.