Monitoring Salinity Issues
Soils develop salinity via interactions with groundwater. If groundwater rises to within 2 metres of the soil surface, water can rise by capillary action to the surface. When this happens, the water can bring salt into the root zone and when the water evaporates at the soil surface, concentrated salts are left behind.
Salinity and rising watertables have widely impacted farming practices across Australia. To tackle this issue, it is essential to identify and measure the impacts through monitoring. Some signs of salinity issues to look for on your farm include; wet patches or boggy areas particularly at the break of the slope, bare areas of soil where nothing grows, white salt crystals or black organic stains on dry soil surface, poor crop germination, plants with wilted leaves, domination of salt tolerant species, and die back of trees.
If you are concerned about salinity issues on your property be sure to borrow one of West Hume Landcare’s 3 Salt Bag kits. The Salt Bag is an easy-to-use kit created by NSW DPI to measure watertables, groundwater and soil salinity in the field. The results provided from the test can assist landowners in making more effective land management decisions and identify salinity issues at an early stage.
If you wish to borrow a kit, please contact our Project Officer.