Making hay the R.U.M. way!

Down in the rich western districts of Victoria, Arthur Leyonhjelm has stuck to his guns and shunned the use of chemical sprays and fertilisers. That's why Arthur was pleased to discover R.U.M. Liquid Plant Food at the Hamilton Sheepvention a few years back. With advice from R.U.M. distributors Dawson Burns Sales, Kipton, VIC. Arthur applied 5L/ha R.U.M. to most of his 525 acres of clover-dominant pasture.

Then, from just 27 acres, he cut 222 clean, sweet-smelling, chemical free, round bales. At around 400kg per bale, that's a lot of clover hay!

"I've copped a fair bit of flack over the years for my unconventional approach but my soil is still in good nick and I don't waste my time jumping from one chemical fad to another", Arthur said. "I've spread rock phosphate in place of super in the past and kept away from urea."

Now, 3L/ha of R.U.M. in April and a further 2L/ha in spring is all that Arthur uses.

"And I've got too much grass", Arthur laughed.

R.U.M. grown pure corn seed

The next bag of Pioneer corn seed you buy could come from Robert Germon's property near Geurie, between Dubbo and Wellington in NSW. And you'll be laughing if it does, because it will have been grown without any chemical input. Just 10L/ha of R.U.M. Liquid Plant Food, and water through a centre-pivot, is needed to grow Robert's 40 acres of irrigated corn.

Using a lucerne/barley/corn rotation, Robert is now harvesting his second crop for Pioneer Seeds.

"There's a big demand for Robert's clean, disease-free seed", reports local R.U.M.-man Geoff Doberer.

You need a lot of cattle for feed like these!

Using regular applications of R.U.M. Liquid Plant Food keeps Bernie O'Kane's pastures producing enough feed to fatten his magnificent Basedaise cattle. But 'roadside farmers', passing by on the Murray Valley Highway in northern Victoria, can be excused if they don't see them for the pasture growth.

Left: Bernie O'Kane shows off some of his prize breeders. Right: Bernie refuses to get off his ag-bike he reckons he's already lost two in this paddock. Local R.U.M. distributor Ian Jolly, Katamatite, VIC, says Bernie's cattle are the best advertisement for R.U.M. in the district.

Whilst Bernie is insisting in his praise of R.U.M. it is hard to get him off the subject of his herd of Basedaise. Imported from Spain about eight years ago, these huge breed-improvers, topping the 500kg mark, naturally put a lot of grazing pressure on Bernie's paddocks.

However 15 acres of clover, phalaris and paspalum pasture, watered regularly from the River Murray near Cobram in Victoria, provide year-round feed.

Bernie puts on regular applications of R.U.M. with his boom-spray and his herd never even gets close to eating this pasture out.