Soils For Life

Courtney Young farms organic grain with her husband Ian in Rutherglen, Victoria, and is also Soils for Life's Farmer Learning Manager. In this episode, she talks with Eli about building a farming life from scratch, growing healthy soil and grain, and turning wheat into a value-added business.
In this episode
How Courtney's path into farming began, from her dad's oyster farming on the NSW South Coast, through a disillusioning stint in conservation, to discovering regenerative agriculture
The economics of getting into farming today, and how Courtney and Ian navigated the challenge of accessing land
Building soil and crop health on their 100-acre property and the family's 2,000-acre organic farm at Berrigan, including intercropping wheat with clover and improving grazing management
The decision to start milling their own flour, turning a commodity crop into a paddock-to-plate product with a loyal following among Melbourne bakers
How Courtney and Ian test new ideas cheaply and quickly, and "fail fast" rather than risk the whole business
Soils for Life's new Cropping Communities program, an eight-location, on-farm and online initiative helping grain growers and mixed farmers interpret soil and plant health data and turn it into action plans

Find out more
If you're interested in the upcoming Cropping Communities training program for growers and cropping advisors, head to soilsforlife.org.au/cropping-communities/

Get in touch
If you have any feedback or questions about this podcast, or suggestions of topics or people you’d like us to include in future episodes, please reach out on social media or via info@soilsforlife.org.au.

World Fungus Day is in October and to mark the occasion we spoke with two mycologists - fungi experts - Dr Sapphire McMullan-Fisher and Julie Fielder about this amazing and mostly hidden lifeform.
Sapphire is a lecturer in plant and fungal Ecology at the University of New England and Julie runs consultancy Phytos Environmental in WA, and both are involved with Fungimap, one of Australia’s longest running citizen science organisations. They’ve both also been involved in the recently published book Fungi for Land: A practical guide for land managers, which draws on the work of more than 25 Australian scientists to explain what fungi do in the landscape and how to manage land in ways that support them.
In this conversation we delve into the weird and wonderful world of fungi, from their ancient beginnings almost 400 million years ago as partners to plants, to their incredible and bizarre present day forms. And we discuss how healthy and diverse fungal ecosystems are so deeply interconnected with, and essential for, healthy and resilient soils, plants and people.
Correction: In the intro we say World Fungus Day is on October 2nd. The date actually varies by country, it's marked across the first week or so of October rather than on one fixed day.Mentioned in this episode:
​Fungi for Land: A practical guide for land managers - https://fungi4land.com/  
​Fun Fungi Ecology - https://www.funfungiecology.com/ 
​Fungimap - https://fungimap.org.au/ 
​iNaturalist - https://www.inaturalist.org/
PhD on metarhizium - https://eprints.qut.edu.au/117674/

About the podcast
David and Ruth Read own and manage Woodcote, a 470 hectare beef cattle trading farm located in East Gippsland, Victoria. 
In this episode, we talk about:
How the Millennium Drought sounded a wake-up call for their farm
The changes they have made since that time including moving towards higher density grazing, establishment of fencing and water infrastructure to support that
Shifting to a primarily trading enterprise and refocusing from feeding animals to feeding biology. 

Ruth and David also share their enthusiasm for learning and adapting, and share a wealth of resources for people to tap into as they make their own farm learning journey.
David and Ruth featured as case study farmers in Soils for Life’s recently released Practice Guide: Grazing for Soil and Landscape Regeneration. They are also hosting the third of our national series of field days launching the guide. If you’re interested to see their work in action, and hear more about their farming practices - alongside grazing educator Brian Wehlburg - join us on September 15 for a day of on-farm learning.
If you’re unable to attend that event in-person, we’ll also be running an online webinar on September the 2nd with Rod and Katrina Butler, another of the farming families featured in the grazing guide.
Resources, links and events from the episode
Soils for Life Practice Guide: Grazing for Soil and Landscape Regeneration: https://soilsforlife.org.au/practice-guide-grazing-soil-landscape-regeneration/ 
Grazing field day: Strategies to build soil and landscape health, 15 September: https://events.humanitix.com/grazing-for-soil-and-landscape-health-field-day 
Grazing Webinar: Getting started with grazing for soil and landscape health: https://events.humanitix.com/grazing-for-soil-and-landscape-health-with-rod-and-katrina-butler
Woodcote Pty Ltd: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100057240318507
Soils for Life’s interview with Grant Williams:⁠https://open.spotify.com/episode/4yQTkVCoaAXNnwPuROxSib?si=rPR1lf6-QkqI_xu3pdL3RQ⁠
Education providers
RCS Grazing For Profit course: https://www.rcsaustralia.com.au/farming-grazing-for-profit-programs/ 
Graeme Hand: https://www.handfortheland.com/ 
Dick Richardson: https://www.naturesequity.com.au/ 
Jim Elizondo: https://www.rwranching.com/ 
KLR Marketing: https://klrmarketing.com.au/
Joel Williams: https://integratedsoils.com/ 

If you have any feedback
If you have any feedback or questions about this podcast, or suggestions of topics or people you’d like us to include in future episodes, please reach out on social media or via info@soilsforlife.org.au.

Hugh and Katie Finlay manage a 30 hectare farm in Central Victoria, including a commercial stone fruit orchard and fruit tree nursery. The farm also includes a range of small enterprises run by others under the banner of the Harcourt Farming Co-op, including a dairy, market garden, and bush foods plot.
Since 2013, Hugh and Katie also have been educating others in how to grow organic and regenerative fruit through their business, Grow Great Fruit. Perennial horticulture is a fairly new area for me, but this conversation reveals some very familiar themes.
Hugh and Katie focus on the soil above all else, and have seen how taking care of soil biology by adding organic matter, fostering plant diversity, and elimination of all synthetic inputs supports healthy trees that are resilient to pests and disease and require little in the way of pest and disease management.
While many of their strategies are applicable at much larger scale than their now downsized operation, Hugh and Katie are also passionate about the value of smaller scale ... about the value of smaller scale enterprises to not only support resilient agricultural businesses, but also connected and thriving regional communities.
Please enjoy this delightful conversation with Hugh and Katie Finlay. And if you're an orchardist yourself or interested in perennial horticulture, don't forget to check out our website for all the resources and events that we're rolling out through our Orchard Resilience project.
Links and resources
Grow Great Fruit - https://growgreatfruit.com/
Harcourt Organic Farming Co-op - https://hofcoop.com.au/about/
YIMBY Compost - https://www.yimbycompost.com/

Murray Gomm is a regenerative farmer and winemaker based near Albany in Western Australia. With his partner Pamela Lincoln, he runs Oranje Tractor Farm, a small organic vineyard and orchard that’s become known for its focus on soil health, biodiversity and carbon-positive farming.
Since the late 1990s, Murray has transformed a degraded property into a thriving, diverse landscape producing wine, fruit, and olive oil. The farm integrates cover crops, composting, mulching, and biological soil management instead of relying on synthetic fertilisers and chemicals.
Murray is a long-time advocate for working with natural systems and is passionate about sharing the message that healthy soils lead to better produce and stronger communities. He regularly speaks on sustainable tourism, carbon farming, and the intersection of agriculture and ecology.
In our conversation, we talk about the value of having a peer group to learn with rather than operating in a vacuum, the role of cover cropping in building diversity and unlocking crop health, soil and plant health monitoring that have helped Murray grow his best tasting peaches ever, and why he now sees himself as a ‘manager of ecological relationships’.
Links and resources
Oranje Tractor Wine and farm
Soils for Life’s Orchard Resilience project
The Orchard Underground WA program for commercial fruit and nut growers, delivered by Soils for Life and RegenWA
Murray has also worked with RegenWA as a cover crop demonstration site
If you have feedback, questions, or suggestions for future episodes or guests, we'd love to hear from you - reach out on social media or at info@soilsforlife.org.au.