In a country where we have the most unreliable rainfall in the world, the emphasis has to be on increasing the percentage of perennial plants in the pasture, be they grasses or shrubs. It is the perennials that can respond to isolated single falls of rain, while annuals can't. Of all the perennials, it is the deep rooted edible shrubs like saltbush that are the most water efficient and reliable. They supplement grasses during the times when grasses have a low protein level. By supplying protein during dry times or after frosts, saltbushes reduce methane emissions per kg of production by ruminant animals (sheep and cattle).
It is time to move on from the narrow perspective of Old Man Saltbush as just a "living haystack" i.e. just a drought reserve. Old Man Saltbush is a management tool which adds flexibility to rural operations, including when it rains.
In 1996, Saltbush Systems director Alan Lauder was approached by the Commonwealth Government to conduct a $272,000 Drought Regional Initiative project. This on property project investigated how Old Man Saltbush could enhance the resilience of production systems, both financially and environmentally. The project looked into using saltbush plantations as a means of resting pastures at the end of dry times, to allow them to regenerate. This new approach of using saltbush to rest pastures when the rain arrived, lead to the CSIRO coining the phrase, "using saltbush in the mud and not the dust". This project resulted in the CSIRO co-authoring a paper for the 1999 International Rangeland Congress on rangeland management.
For discussion on how cattle select their diet over time and how this influences the amount of methane produced per kg of production, go to Beef Central.
Further information
Australian Farm Journal Article (May 2008) (PDF 1.1MB)