| Canola was introduced to Australia over 20 years ago, since then it has become one of the four major winter crops. The area of canola harvested has increased from around 400,000 ha in the mid 1990s, to 1.9 million ha in 1999-2000, producing 2.4 million tonnes of canola. Western Australia and NSW have experienced the most rapid growth of canola production.
(reference Parkinson, A. and Hindmarsh,R. Farmers reject GM canola. In Australasian Science, Vol 24, No 6, July 2003, at 20. )
Click (*here) for the Office of the Gene Technology PDF file titled "Biology and ecology of canola"
Canola growing in Australia
Canola is predominately growing as a cash crop and as break crop for wheat. Wheat usually follows canola in our rotations. Key areas that canola is grown: all major wheat growing regions of W.A, S.A, Vic and NSW. Very little is grown in Qld.
Sowing time: Normally on the autumn break - mid April to Late May, although this season with very late break sowings continued in to June.
Key Weeds: Grass weeds annual ryegrass, wild oats, brome grass, silver grass, barley grass and volunteer cereals.
Broadleaf weeds wild radish, mustard, turnip, capeweed, fumitory, wireweed, patersons curse, toadrush, spiny emex, - plus many more depending on regions.
Key Herbicides:
Knockdowns prior to sowing Roundup PowerMax (& other glyphosate formulations), SpraySeed (paraquat + diquat).
The majority of the crop is direct drilled or under minimum tillage, with a high dependency on glyphosate formulations.
Pre Emergent Avadex Xtra, Trifluralin, Stomp, Dual, & for Triazine Tolerant canola varieties simazine & atrazine.
Post Emergent Group A selective grass herbicides Fusilade, Select, Targa, Sertin, Verdict etc.
Triazine Tolerant canola varieties atrazine. Lontrel
ClearField Canola OnDuty herbicide.
Herbicide groups
A Selective grass herbicides
B Onduty
C Simazine, Atrazine
D Trifluralin
I Lontrel
K Dual
M Glyphosate
ON FARM PROCESSES:
Weed control: A crop will not yield productively if it is overpowered by weeds. Photo shows pre-emergent spraying for early weed control and this process is repeated as necessary using different chemicals in the post-emergent stages dependent on the weeds present.
Seeding: the canola seeds are planted with the fertiliser required.
Canola flowers are known for their distinct yellow flowers in spring.
When pods are almost ripe, canola is swathed/windrowed (cut and left in rows) to gain even ripening before harvest. The dry canola swath rows are then harvested.
Photo shows ripe seeds and pods (note size comparison with match):
Harvested seed is transferred to trucks:
Canola is delivered to local seed receival point for distribution to market:
Seed is crushed. Half will result in canola oil, mainly used for human consumption and the remaining meal is sold for stock feed.
Julie Newman, Network of Concerned Farmers |
