When we designed our home we envisaged it would look like a corrugated shed splonked in the middle of a pasture. However when the building was finished, we received a corrugated shed plonked in the middle of barren dirt. Investigation proceeded last year and we ended up at the Department of Agriculture in Northam talking to anyone who knew about perennial pastures. We bought an amazing book on the topic and it has been carefully filed away for about a year.
The previous blog mentioned the installation of sprinklers in front of the house and I had thought that we would just select some available pasture grasses and spread the seed out and voila! instant pasture - not so simple. Here in Western Australia both Temperate and Sub-tropical perennial grasses can be planted. The Temperate grasses are active in Winter and the Sub-tropical appear in Summer. Then, just to complicate the issue a little more, we are using salty water from a bore, so our grasses must be salt tolerant. This discovery tour started with a seed produce store, then went to a farming authority, then the Department of Agriculture and finally to another seed produce store. After taking all advice, I chose Tall Wheat Grass, Tall Fescue and 2 varieties of clover with Alosca innoculant to sow now in Winter. Then in late August when hopefully it will be still wet, but warming up, I will sow BamBatsi Panic and Rhodes Grass which are Summer active. I am having 7 kg of seed delivered by Austalia Post and should receive it in a couple of days.
It would be a great problem to report later in the year that we had so much pasture we had to slash and feed it to 'the boys' - one can only hope.
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