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Plant/Animal Production
Pasture production on the North West slopes
This material addresses aspects of the following syllabus outcome:
H2.1 describes the inputs, processes and interactions of plant production systems.
The work presented in the following section contributes towards achieving the following syllabus content areas:
Students learn about:
Constraints on plant production
- the constraints imposed by environmental factors
Managing plant production
- the interaction of genotype with environment and management
Experimental analysis and research in plant/animal systems
- the collection and analysis of data
Extract from Stage 6 Agriculture Syllabus NSW Board of Studies Amended 2009
In the example titled, Pasture Production on the Northern Tablelands, you worked through an activity that modelled the skills of summarising information in a table, drawing graphs and conclusions. In this activity you will use climatic data and estimated growth rates for pastures to draw tables and graphs and form conclusions about pasture growth on the North West slopes of NSW. Before you complete this activity you should have studied the example Pasture Production on the Northern Tablelands.
North West Slopes
- Choose a site and gather the climatic data for a region.
Gunnedah is located on the North West Slopes and climatic data is available for it. In order to obtain the climatic average data you should visit the Bureau of Meteorology (Climatic Averages)
web site and locate the appropriate average climatic
data for Gunnedah. This data should include:
- mean daily maximum temp
- mean daily minimum temp
- mean rainfallfor each month of the year.
You should then draw up a table and record your climatic data in it.
- Draw a graph presenting the climatic average data.
Just as the graph was drawn for Glen Innes in Pasture Production on the Northern Tablelands, presenting the climatic average data, you should draw a graph presenting the climatic average data for Gunnedah. - Draw a graph of estimated growth rate of pastures on the North West Slopes.
Draw a graph showing the growth rates of a variety of pasture species on the North West Slopes by using the raw data of dry matter gain per day (kg/ha/day) shown here.
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec phalaris/ sub clover 8 11 16 18 15 15 16 21 35 45 38 15 summer grass dominant 35 29 17 8 2 2 2 2 4 10 20 28 danthonia/sub clover 18 16 10 8 6 6 6 15 26 29 25 20 lucerne 23 22 24 22 16 15 12 16 23 25 22 20 sub clover dominant 0 2 3 4 5 7 8 11 27 35 28 5 medic dominant 0 2 3 4 5 5 6 8 30 35 19 0 oats 0 0 0 15 35 32 28 30 45 48 8 0 - Compare the graph presenting the climatic average data with the graph showing the estimated growth rate of pastures on the North West Slopes.
You should compare the pasture growth graph for the North West Slopes with the climatic average data for Gunnedah and draw some conclusions as was done for the Northern Tablelands.
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