Neil Harris, Stephen Hobbs, Mark Ritchie shortlisted for sustainable sheep award

The three producers include Neil Harris, Costerfield, Stephen Hobbs, Kavina and Mark Ritchie, Mansfield.

Neil Harris believes graziers should treat their soil like they treat their stomachs.

The Costerfield woolgrower runs about 4500 Merino ewes across hectares north-east of Heathcote and believes soil biology is key to his success.

Producing 18 micron wool, Mr Harris uses a range of regenerative agriculture practices to improve what he calls lizard country which is "light and infertile"

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Part of this process includes spreading chicken manure and compost, or garden waste, straw and other organic matter which is turned into a natural fertiliser.

Each year he purchases about 500 tonnes of compost to spread.

"I've been down many roads looking for the magic answers about how to make it more sustainable and profitable," Mr Harris said.

"It's a mixture of 90 per cent biological and 10pc traditional inputs."

"The soil is no different to our stomach really because you go out to a restaurant and let's say you only have steak, you're going to be pretty flat the next morning because you haven't had a balanced diet and your soil is the same."

Mr Harris said he developed many of his sustainable traits from the late John Pannan, a producer who farmed south of Horsham, and helped teach him "how to read the soils and get balance in the ground".

"When I started with John, I put in a range of inputs such as limes, dolomites, and compost and then we started to address the next range of issues like your phosphorus, potassium and nitrogen."

"The other thing he focused on was the energy in the soil and when you had an early break, your pastures would sprint out of the blocks and then when it comes to the drying time, it would hang on, giving you an extra four to six weeks either side of the growing season."

"Once you have the microbes happy in the soil, they will work for you for free of charge - there's no 5pc pay rise for them."

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Mr Harris' properties can carry up to 10,000 sheep.

He farms with wife, Jane, his son, Nathan, niece, Alan and is president of the Seymour Wool Marketing Group.

Delatite Station owner Mark Ritchie believes his family were farming sustainably long before the concept was fashionable.

Mr Ritchie along with his wife Fenella own the 2600-hectare pastoral holding at Mansfield, which includes owned and leased land, with a flock of 18,000 sheep and 1250 breeding cows.

"Sustainability has always been our focus without really understanding the concept," he said.

"We've planted a lot of trees over a long amount of time, we've fenced off waterways to improve water quality on the rivers and creeks through the place and we've built plantations to provide wildlife corridors."

Mr Ritchie believes he has planted more than 20,000 trees on the property, improved water quality in streams and creeks and boosted the presence of native birds on his property as a result of farming sustainably.

"We were probably doing it just because it was the right thing to do years ago," he said.

"When we started, it wasn't about putting carbon back into the system and that's reflective of so many farmers really.

The operation employs three full-time workers.

Fourth-generation Kanvia sheep farmer Stephen Hobbs says the catalyst for overhauling his agricultural enterprise was a one in one hundred year frost which wiped out crops across the region.

That was in October 1997 and started a gradual change for the Hobbs family to farm holistically.

In the following two years, however, similar late frosts were also recorded.

"That made me think I'm really lucky because I won't have any frosts for the next 300 years or the climate has changed," Mr Hobbs said.

In an attempt to supplement his income, Mr Hobbs started working at a small seed cleaning and processing company to offset the farm takings.

He also started to delve into historical rainfall records to determine if the late frosts and dry times were a trend, or something out of the ordinary.

"I found that indeed things were changing and from 1990 there was a huge shift in the weather pattern compared to the previous 90-100 years.

"Prior to that, we used to have one drought every 10 years and then we'd have a wet year every decade and five or six average years.

"But it wasn't normal to get multiple dry seasons in a row and that's what's happening now."

At the time, Mr Hobbs was running 30 per cent sheep and 70pc cropping because it was "more fun" to sit on a tractor and listen to a tape of the latest top 40s instead of "fighting sheep" in the yards.

"We reviewed the whole farming system and I started to understand the season had shifted significantly with hot days of 30 degrees or more creeping into April and a reduction of rainfall in the growing season," he said.

"It meant the growing season had shortened by a month."

As a result, Mr Hobbs reverted to a 30pc cropping and 70pc sheep enterprise, something his father Ron did on their 800-hectare property before he took over.

Early-maturing sheep were selected with profit as a key driver in their decision making.

The operation includes 1200 sheep including a mix of Merino/Dohne and South African Meat Merino.