Monday, 12 May 2025
We had an excellent roll up of thirty-eight (38) for this event, forty for lunch with our coach driver & host as guests, along with one (1) new member Bill Lyons – Welcome Bill.
Following our usual check in etc we loaded up & headed for the farm, picking up our Host for the day Paul McVeigh in Dalby on our way to his son Steve’s Cotton Farm at Nandi. Paul gave us a bit of a general overview & said he would leave it to Steve to do our guided tour of the farm. Paul, former Mayor of the Western Downs Shire has retired from farming & now resides in Dalby.
On arrival at the farm, we were met by Steve & had our Smoko on the lawn outside the beautiful homestead before embarking on our tour of the farm.
The name of the Farm “Loch Eaton,” obviously it has some Scottish Connection, set the tone for our visit to see this amazing cotton farming operation of the McVeigh clan, with Paul & his son Steve.
Steve was brilliant in his explanation of their current situation of looking at ways to minimise the costs of farming, probably their greatest challenge. To a degree they are now going back to the idea of crop rotation and time for fallow of the fields. They have cotton followed by either wheat, corn, sorghum or chickpeas cropping, and maybe a period of fallow for a field. The reason for this is because of the need to have a guaranteed crop each year and if not the breakeven is out the window.
Costs of labour and the need to have staff out setting up syphon irrigation has them now looking at the Bankless System of irrigation. We were able to observe a few different types of irrigation in use to different degrees, ranging from a large Pivot, Syphoning out of Channels, & some Flood.
They have 3 major pumps on the Condamine River which backs on to their property and have storage of around 42,000 mega litres. When the river flows over the spillway of Loudon Weir they can pump up to 21 mega litres at a time up to their allowed draw of 120 mg litres per pump (Licence/Permit). They estimate that have a loss of water through evaporation of around 1 mg litre each day, however, they believe that there may be other issues involved in that, and really until the storage is empty, they cannot look at other possible causes of loss e.g. seepage – Possibly do some de-silting as well.
In was interesting to hear that they gather & use input from a combination of Sources (e.g. Satellites, Drones, & Tractors) to fine tune what they set up in the Tractor Computers these days to carry out their levelling. Level corrections are mostly carried out by using soil within the field, however, sometimes they are forced into bringing in soil which they prefer not to do again because of the expense.
We watched a harvester going up and down a couple of rows. These machines range in price from around 1.1M to 1.95M depending on whether you purchase the Chinese, or John Deere Original Model – It is easy to see why the Chinese version could be attractive as it is a massive saving with an added bonus that it will use all of John Deere spare parts, who have an excellent Worldwide spare parts network.
In the past most cotton was compacted into large modules in bins but now these new harvesters can automatically put them into round bales each around 2.5 tonnes, & then after ginning about 43% is bailed cotton lint that we were able to see at the Cotton Australia ginnery later that afternoon. They are attempting to get 14 – 16 bales to the hectare and that is a big ask – However, they plan for a minimum of 12 bales with a breakeven point at 10 bales.
Following are a few more observations etc –
- Cotton farmers are required to plant a “Sacrificial Section” of cotton that is not sprayed for pests to focus & attract boll weevil so that the moth will attack that section & keep away from the main crop – It is easy to see the benefits of spraying as these sections only return around 2 round bales per hectare compared with 12 plus in the sprayed areas – Massive difference.
- As the input costs are increasing all the time, Steve sees further mechanisation as the way of the future.
- The farm employs 10 permanent staff, deployed in farm provided housing around the farm, for efficient operation of the farm. Win-Win.
- Steve has a good “Trade Off” deal going with Qld. Cotton i.e. Cotton Seed for Ginnery Fees – A Win – Win. Once the lint & trash is removed Qld. Cotton can market & sell the cotton seed as stock feed, or, as cotton seed oil for cooking.
- Arrow Energy have multiple compressor stations on the farm & send Gas under pressure to Oakey Power Gas Station – Royalties paid would supplement farm income along with the waste they produced during drilling etc (Water) being available to the farm – Another Win – Win.
Following the excellent Guided Tour, Warwick thanked Steve on our behalf & we loaded up & travelled to the Ginnery where we were met by Elissa Lucas (Ginnery Manager) who welcomed & then provided us with an overview of the Ginnery Operations including their large secure/undercover storage area. Unfortunately, she had organised for the modules to be processed today rather than the round bales that Paul had asked for. It was amazing to see these large modules being drawn in to a thing that separated the cotton bulk and distributed it across the 6 Ginning machines that separated/cleaned the trash and seed from the lint and that is then made up into bales ready for export.
The Ginnery was currently operating on one 12-hour shift and by the end of June they will move to 2 x 12-hour shifts per week. 1000 Ginnery Bales (smaller than round bales) are produced each shift.
They also have Very Large Climate Regulated storage sheds out the back of the Gin where Qld. Cotton owned bales are stored ready for export. Bales owned by others are stored in the open – This should provide an incentive for growers to sell to Qld. Cotton you would think!
We did see 2 B-Double semitrailers leave while we were there.
Another excellent guided tour, & once again Warwick thanked Elissa on our behalf & we loaded up & travelled onto Dalby Rugby Leagues Club for lunch.
After lunch we acknowledged & celebrated birthdays falling in May in our usual manner with birthday cake Viz. Terry Donnollan, Howard Gregson, Bob Kraut, John Kruger, David Lynch, Michael Keating & Ross Morley.
In closing, special thanks to those who contributed to making this another safe & enjoyable event for all attendees, including:
- Warwick Dingle, Paul Reynolds & Paul McVeigh – For organising this event. Warwick thanked Paul after lunch on our behalf for hosting this wonderful, interesting day out for us.
- Steve McVeigh & his wife – For opening their home toilet facilities & lawns etc to us – great country hospitality, & Steve for his very interesting & informative guided tour – Well done all around & much appreciated.
- Lorraine Betros – For our wonderful home-made fresh sandwiches.
- Staff at the Dalby Rugby Leagues Club for our great lunch.
- Warwick Dingle & Bob Whittaker – For being on duty as our Trusty First Aid officers, along with Warwick for the numerous other roles that he carries out such as head counting on the coach to ensure we leave nobody behind at each stop, ensuring all the gear is available for loading on the coach, & for along with Nick our driver for ensuring we all got on & off the coach safely at each stop standing in for our usual doorman, Peter Thompson.
- Michael Bourke & Russell Mauch – For looking after our Finances & Name Badges, & Russell for the Receipting & Banking of our surplus cash.
- Warwick & Russell – For assisting the Club staff with the timely & efficient delivery of our lunches, & for cutting up serving of our birthday cake.
- Lindsay Reis, Eric & John Canning – For their usual gig of looking after our hydration & hygiene needs with bottled water & handwash respectively, along with the loading & unloading of the coach, as required.
- Rowdy Reid, Paul Reynolds & Sandy Fraser – For dispersing the hot water & cups etc. at Smoko.
- Jan Neal – For making our much-appreciated birthday cake.
- Nick Peters – Our favourite driver for transporting us to & from Nandi safely.
- Mark Rowland – For his notes on the Guided Tour Highlights.
- Peter Taylor, Mark Rowland & Warwick Dingle – For sharing the photos they each took on the day with us.
- To Conclude, I have no hesitation in declaring this trip as a great success – It provided us with an up-to-date insight into the current operating practices of a typical modern farm operation using irrigation.
Dick
18 May 2025