This review of waterlogging in the Australian landscape examines potential for occurrence of waterlogging, soil and plant response, and reduction in crop yield and economics due to waterlogging. The review highlights enormous scope to include recent improved understanding of plant physiological processes involved in waterlogging, along with a standardised minimum dataset, into crop growth, water use, and yield simulation models. This is suggested to result in better biological process models as well as improved capacity to predict likelihood of waterlogging, yield effects, and economic consequences, thus enhancing information available to farmers.

Cereal crop yields are improved when break crops are grown, but previous studies had not quantified the effect reducing the incidence of one disease, take-all (Gaumannomyces graminis var. tritici) had on improvements to wheat yield. Retrospective analysis of wheat yield and take all data from crop sequence trials run in South Australia, New South Wale and the Australian Capital Territory revealed break crops increased cereal yields by 0.7 t/ha. On 14 of the 18 site by season scenarios evaluated, the suppression of take all contributed to the overall break crop effect. In 6 instances this contribution exceeded 0.1 t/ha and in one instance the contribution equated to 80% of the break crop effect. Therefore take-all can severely damage wheat, and does so occasionally.

Pre-harvest sprouting (PHS) in wheat severely reduces yield and end-use quality, resulting in substantial economic losses. The use of resistant cultivars is a more economical and environmentally friendly approach to reduce the damage. Chinese winter wheat line CA 0431 with white grain showed high PHS resistance for many years. In this paper, four quantitative trait loci (QTLs) of PHS resistance, QPhs.caas-2BL, QPhs.caas-3AS.1, QPhs.caas-3AS.2 and QPhs.caas-3AL, were identified in this line. QPhs.caas-2BL is likely a new QTL flanked by markers Xbarc1042 and Xmag3319. CA 0431 and the detected markers can be used in breeding programs targeting improvement of PHS resistance for white kernel wheat.

The response of kernel number and weight per kernel to the availability of resources during the crop cycle is relevant to understand the effect of stresses on yield. Kernel number was accounted for by resource availability per plant around silking. Potential weight per kernel was established immediately after silking but final kernel weight was limited by source capacity during the grain filling period. Agronomic practices and breeding strategies could be reconsidered in the light of these results.

Altering shoot growth, root structure and root exudation are important adaptive strategies for nutrient uptake when plants grow in low soil nutrient environments. This study showed that wild genotypes of narrow-leafed lupin differing in root structure differed in rhizosphere exudation and phosphorus uptake. The outcomes of this study can be used for the selection of phosphorus-efficient genotypes for cropping systems.

Livestock production is limited by perennial ryegrass pastures that only grow for 8-9 months of the year and don’t respond to summer rainfall.  Careful matching of summer-active pastures to soil types allows feed to grow throughout the year - giving high quality summer feed without a winter feed quantity penalty.  Additional benefits include increased animal production, flexibility in tough times because of a more diverse mix of pasture types and environmentally sound use of soil water.

Reduction of annual net primary production is predicted for Australian temperate grasslands and livestock industries under future climate. We assess effectiveness of various grassland management options to offset decline in production and profitability of livestock industry by effect of climate change. We predicted that in 2030, the feedbase adaptations can return profitability of the most beef cattle, steer enterprises and Merino ewe enterprises to that of the 1970-1999 reference period. For crossbred ewe and wether enterprises, a return to historical profit levels was predicted to occur at about half of the southern Australia locations, mainly in high rainfall zone.

Cenchrus ciliaris (L.) (buffel grass) is a drought-tolerant C4 forage species where salt tolerance information was scarce. Our results suggest that cvv. Texas and Biloela of this species can be planted in soils with up to EC 5 dS/m in the saturated paste extract with only minor decreases in biomass production and yield. However, stand persistence in highly saline soils may be limited by seed yield and germination.