Coulton family of Morella Agriculture continues to expand while managing precious resource, water
Water is the most precious resource for the Coulton family of Morella Agriculture.
THE Coulton family is on the white track — and not looking back.
And while the pioneers of the cotton industry in southern Queensland’s MacIntyre Valley prefer to fly under the radar, they have continued to expand in an effort to challenge themselves, spread risk across different enterprises and climates, and ultimately to put in place a solid succession plan. All this while managing their most precious resource — water — in a sustainable way.
The Coultons’ Morella Agriculture business involves David and Kim Coulton and their three sons, Andrew, Thomas and Sam. They operate across a number of properties totalling a massive 809,371ha spread from Thargomindah to Goondiwindi, Bungunya and Toobeah in Queensland as well as from Boggabilla to Ebor in northern NSW.
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They farm about 5500ha of irrigated cotton, 7000-8000ha of cereal crops and run 4000 Angus breeding cows, as well as trading about 10,000 cattle and operating a 2000-head feedlot.
With succession planning an important strategy for the family, each of the brothers manage separate properties, with Tom and wife Bridget based at Tandawanna North at Bungunya, Andrew and Liz running Neilo at Toobeah, and Sam and Claudia on the home property, Morella, at Boggabilla.
“Dad set out to ensure he had three home places for each of us, the idea being we could work together, but make decisions independently as well,” Sam said.
The Coulton family first started farming in the area in the early 1900s at Getta Getta at North Star in NSW. They added Alcheringa at Boggabilla in the late 1960s, transforming it from sheep grazing country to an irrigation property and establishing the Alcheringa Irrigation Company.
Sam praised his grandparents Keith and Patricia Coulton for helping pioneer the Bakes Scheme Project and lobbying to get the Pindari Dam capacity raised, which resulted in cotton irrigation development in the area.
Alcheringa was one of the first irrigated cotton properties in the MacIntyre Valley, with the first crop planted in 1978.
“The first cotton crop made 2.7 bales per acre (6.7 bales a hectare) and sold for $500 a bale,” Sam said.
GROW FOR IT
DAVID and Kim established Morella Agriculture in 1995 and the family’s most-recent land acquisition was in 2016 when they paid a reported $16 million for the 720,000ha Nappa Merrie Station at Thargomindah — home to the Burke and Wills Dig Tree — which they had leased for the previous 18 months. In the same year they also bought Coolawara at Ebor to finish stock on.
Sam said their expansion strategy was to enter lease agreements with the option to buy.
“We get to know the property and if then it goes on the market, we have first right of refusal,” he said.
Sam said while expansion provided “better economies of scale” the enjoyment they got from farming and taking on new challenges were also factored in to their decision-making.
“The geographical spread means we can combat changing weather and it can offset cashflow issues with having everything in one spot,” Sam said.
While cotton is the Coultons’ main enterprise, they also grow wheat, chick peas, barley, sorghum and corn.
“If you’ve got water you can grow anything, but cotton is the best to grow with water at the moment,” said Sam, adding that the area planted to cotton was heavily dependent on water availability.
“We are mindful that water is our limiting factor and it is key to our industry,” he said.
The Coultons budget on using six megalitres of water a hectare to grow the crop.
“As water has been tightening up, we have been focusing heavily on how many bales per megalitre we can produce, and we find that is helping,” Sam said.
“If we have full water we can grow good crops, but we don’t always have enough water, so we have been budgeting on anywhere above 1.5 to 2.5 bales to a megalitre of water.”
GRAND PLANS
THE Coultons plan meticulously, each season sitting down and budgeting how much crop they will grow with the water allocation they have.
Sam said they typically liked to “take a calculated risk” to be prepared for extra water or rain falling during the growing season.
As part of this, they have the set amount of cotton they “look after” and then the extra they plant, which they often do on different row configurations than their normal 1m spacings.
While the Coultons were among the first to grow dryland cotton in Australia, they only do so when they have good stubble and a full moisture profile.
Due to the geographical spread of their properties and soil types, which range from self-mulching clay to brigalow country, the family uses different cotton varieties, typically Bollgard 3 Sicot 746 and 748 which Sam said had performed well in challenging summers.
The Coultons try and wait until it rains before planting, usually in the first week of November. While they previously planted in September-October, the introduction of new varieties meant they now can plant up until the end of December.
Cotton harvest takes place in April and May, with crops returning about 12 bales/ha. Yields have risen from 10 bales/ha five years ago
This year the Coultons grew a third of the crop they normally would, with a dry period followed by 200mm of rain in three hours just before the start of picking at Morella. Drought and a lack of water means they are not likely to grow any cotton this season.
Sam said this was where the different sources of cash flow helped.
“It is very tough,” he said. “We try to budget, we cut costs but not essential costs as you have to be positive in what you are doing. Australia is a funny place, it changes overnight.”
“We try hard and be positive. We don’t go spending too much money we don’t have, but we are prepared as things do change.”
Sam said the current market for cotton was “very good” with prices of more than $500 a bale historically strong.
The Coultons forward-market their cotton, often up to three years, if they have water and can guarantee production.
“It gives us a price to budget around and gives us certainty,” Sam said.
LOGGED ON
AS with any cotton enterprise, technology is a big part of the day-to-day management.
The Coultons use a WEEDit precision sprayer to cut down on the chemical use as well as controlled traffic, no till and RTK (2cm accuracy) auto-steer systems.
They also yield-map and have been using variable-rate fertiliser application for 15 years.
Moisture probes are dotted across the property to monitor water use, which has also helped with watering schedules. There are also dam monitors.
“They have been instrumental in helping us trying to grow more bales to the hectare for less water,” Sam said, adding that moisture levels were monitored by an app on their phones.
Crops are watered by a mix of flood and overhead irrigation, as well as from pipes through banks. The Coultons are also investigating the potential of bankless irrigation.
Winter cropping is also an important aspect of the business to maintain, and improve, soil health. The Coultons operate on a rotation of cotton every second year.
With winter crops, barley is sown around the middle of April followed by wheat a month later and then chick peas. Depending on rain, dryland sorghum is planted between September and December.
Harvest of winter crops kicks off at the start of November, with benchmark yields 2.5 tonnes/ha for wheat and barley and 1.8 tonnes/ha for chick peas.
The family also has a strong interest in cattle. Kim is the daughter of Bob and Kerrie Crothers, who established Rangers Valley feedlot at Glen Innes and started their breeding herd in 1997 with the purchase of 30 Angus heifers for a then-Australian record.
Sam said they had a strong focus on breeding quality Angus cattle, with good genetics and began buying bulls from Victorian-based Te Mania Angus stud in about 2000.
“We have always focused on genetics and selecting extremely good bulls, while also making sure our heifers are sound, fertile and with the right phenotype,” Sam said.
He said the family culled “hard” and liked a “structurally sound animal that is highly fertile and has good 200, 400 and 600-day weight gain”.
They also focused on fat cover and marbling, and preferred animals with a large frame.
“Mum always says you have to have frame to hang meat on,” Sam said. “We like cattle with good bone structure and a big frame.”
The Coultons also place a strong emphasis on maternal lines with their females consistently achieving conception rates of above 90 per cent.
Joining takes place from August for an autumn calving, with heifers mated to calve at two years of age.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
THE Angus breeders are mostly run on the Goondiwindi properties, on natural pastures and forage crops as needed.
Most progeny from the herd are sold to Rangers Valley feedlot, who firstly background them on grass to 400-450kg in preparation for the Japanese bullock market.
For the past few years the Coultons have been trying to keep as many heifers as they can to expand herd numbers and have been crossing the heifers with a Wagyu bull for the F1 market.
Sam said it gave them another cash-flow stream and helped with calving.
“We weren’t having calving difficult but we were heavily selecting on birth weights for bulls, and while we haven’t relaxed it, it has given us the opportunity to focus on other traits and it helps with management as it is hard to get around heifers on such a big spread of country when calving,” he said.
The trade cattle are mostly crossbred Angus grown out in the Channel Country and are sold to a feedlot or premium grass-fed market.
While the Coultons have a strong family link and longstanding relationship with Rangers Valley feedlot, Sam said they preferred not to be locked in to any markets.
“We want to be flexible, because the climate can throw a curve ball and throw everything out,” he said.
The Coultons receive carcass data feedback, which ranks most of their steers in the top 5 per cent for killing traits.
When it comes to staff, attracting the right workers and taking care of them is paramount. “We like having staff that return to the community they all live in as they are backbone of the company,” Sam said, adding they aimed to keep a good core of permanent employees, with a particular effort at Morella to employ indigenous Australians.
EYES FRONT
WITH water now becoming such a topic of public discussion, the Coultons have been trying to adapt to using less while remaining viable.
They are proud of the way the MacIntyre Valley has shared water, but disappointed with the way cotton farmers have been portrayed by the mainstream media.
David said recent years had been “incredibly difficult” with most of their woes caused by natural drought.
“If this is climate change, we should be working together,” he said.
Sam said one of the misrepresentations had been around when irrigators were able to pump water.
“We can only pump our licensed allocated water when it is high flow,” Sam said.
“We aren’t taking water if there is a low flow, and there are checks and balances on when we can pump our allocated water — everything is metered using telemetry and secondarily ground-truthed by a water officer.”
David said the valley’s water-sharing plan was good, but rainfall in the past 20 years rainfall had been the lowest on record.
“There has been a lot of financial sacrifice from the whole industry to be united and to have sustainable rivers,” Sam said. “Each producer has given up a lot. We didn’t get it (water) taken away, we gave it up. As times have become so tough, everyone has had to get more efficient and better at what we do or we will be out.”
For the Coultons, it is the white approach.
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