The problem being was the build up of undesirable animal urine and dung around the edges of the dams and so eventually the dam becomes polluted. Cattle will still drink from the dambut will not consume the necessary amount of water there for reducing animal performance.

Our floodplains have numerous dams spread across them and would have supplied sufficient water for the cell grazing operation but we too realised how rank the water looked towards the middle to end of the dry season. So we opted to do the job properly and install a trough in every paddock within the cell.

Water delivery of 2 to 2.5 litres per second was the benchmark required to adequately drink 2000 plus head from one trough. I gave the job to “Southern Cross” to design the best layout in the paddock and to also supply the correct pump system to pressurize the pipe to achieve the 2 litres per second.

floodplain cell map

Electric fencing is no doubt the most cost effective means of keeping cattle where you want them. At first, there was no way I was going to use electric fencing. The Northern Territory is a “tough” place with “tough” cattle that need “tough” fencing. Talk about a “Paradigm shift”, I have now tried electric fencing and have been blown away with its effectiveness.

The paddocks in our cell system on our floodplains have been constructed with steel
Star pickets, 25 metres apart with one hotwire running at about 750mm above the ground. Between each picket we attached pink surveyors tape to assist in the wire to stand out. Gateways were made using the Gallagher gate handles and gateways were about 25 metres wide. The majority of the wire was 2.5mm flexi bell by Waratah with 4mm wire running through the centre of the cell to assist in limiting the loss of voltage over long distances.

The Gallagher energizer we use is the MX7500, the most powerful energizer on the market today.

The earth system that we built involved 3 galvanised star pickets (Waratah maxi extreme) 1.8m long driven into the ground 1m apart. This earth station was located down on the floodplain about 300m from the energizer itself. The pickets were driven all the way into the ground with only a couple of inches left above the ground to attach the earth cable. The small earth area was then fenced off from stock and any possible mishaps with vehicle tyres.

The fencing set-up is actually very fast and cost effective. It’s reliable and certainly creates a psychological barrier.

Paddock sizes are reduced using electric fencing. (paddock size depends on cattle numbers and pasture quality)

Large mobs of cattle are rotated through smaller paddocks quickly. Movements within the cell could be as quick as 1 day.

The full rotation through the paddocks within the cell here at Finniss River is 30 days.

So cattle are back were they started 30 days later eating fresh regrowth. It is this fresh regrowth that is the highest in nutrition.

The following help explain the process and principles of cell grazing.