Monitoring soil moisture in
grazing systems
In 2013, BIGG initiated a project to monitor soil moisture in local grazing systems (funded by a Caring for Our Country Community Landcare Grant). This involved the establishment of telemetry based weather monitoring stations located in three representative pasture paddocks (Flaxman Valley, Keyneton, Koonunga), which was the first time a farming systems group in S.A. has demonstrated soil moisture monitoring in pastures.
In 2019, a fourth station located in a native pasture paddock at Moculta was installed via funding from Adelaide and Mt Lofty Ranges NRM Board’s ‘Supporting Sustainable Primary Production’ grant. Additional support for the project was also received from the AMLR in 2020.
Each station comprises a sub-surface capacitance probe measuring moisture to a depth of 85cm, an automatic rain gauge and sensors measuring air temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, wind direction, NDVI and solar radiation. These are connected to a solar powered telemetry unit that transmits data every 15 minutes via a mobile phone network to an internet server. Data downloaded from the server is then used to produce real-time graphs for each site.
The ‘live data’ from BIGG’s Flaxman Valley, Keyneton, Koonunga and Moculta weather stations can be viewed at:
http://toip-server.net.au:8080/custdata/bigg/webapp/index.html
A network of soil moisture probes are also located throughout the SA Murray-Darling Basin region. Further further information about their soil moisture status can be accessed here.
Monthly soil moisture monitoring reports – 2017-22
Monthly analysis on the status of the four local paddocks (located at Flaxman Valley, Keyneton, Koonunga and Moculta) being monitored for their soil moisture use.
Case Studies
BIGG Water Catchment Case Study: Dale Button
August 2021
BIGG Farmer Case Study: Luke Clark
August 2020
BIGG Farmer Case Study: Graham Keynes
July 2019
BIGG Farmer Case Study: Michael Evans
July 2019
BIGG Farmer Case Study: Peter Kleinig
July 2019
Project Case Study: Measuring soil moisture leads to better pasture
Natural Resources Adelaide and Mount Lofty Ranges, July 2018
Videos and Webinars
Surveys and Presentations
Regional Water Security: BIGG Survey Report
May 2021
Survey Report: BIGG's soil moisture and climate monitoring activities
June 2020
BIGG's Soil moisture monitoing project - whats been happening lately?
BIGG annual conference presentation, Brett Nietschke - Feb 2020
Project Survey Report: the use and application of data being recorded from BIGG's weather monitoring stations
July 2019
Soil moisture presentations at BIGG's Annual Conference - February 2018
Presentations at BIGG’s soil moisture monitoring workshop – April 2014
Disclaimer: The data generated from the BIGG soil moisture monitoring sites is provided for information only. Any actions or decisions made by users is at their sole discretion.