450 cattle have been fitted with eShepherd neckbands .
Drought resilience
Drought can devastate primary industries and the regional communities they support . NQ Dry Tropics supports the Burdekin agricultural community to adopt drought and climate adaptation strategies , supported by the best available science . We work with a range of organisations to plan , design and deliver activities to improve drought resilience in the region through the initiatives listed below :
Funded through the Australian Government ’ s Future Drought Fund :
� Long-term Trials of Drought Resilient Farming Practices ( Virtually Fencing Free ).
� Tropical North Queensland ( TNQ ) Drought Hub .
Funded by the Queensland Government ’ s Drought and Climate Adaptation , the University of Southern Queensland , and Meat and Livestock Australia ;
� Northern Australia Climate Program .
Launch of five-year Virtually Fencing Free project
The Virtually Fencing Free project , delivered by NQ Dry Tropics in partnership with the Queensland Department of Agriculture and Fisheries , aims to develop drought resilient grazing systems to maximise pasture performance , rainfall response and animal production , while improving long-term land condition .
Conducted at Spyglass Beef Research Facility , near Charters Towers , the five-year pilot project is testing the extent to which eShepherd virtual fencing neckbands enable rangeland graziers to modify grazing systems in northern rangelands beef cattle herds .
The trial aims to address several knowledge gaps using a science-based approach . Mobile connectivity remains a major limiting factor preventing wider uptake of the adoption of technologies , therefore , the project team will test the suitability of Starlink broadband internet for supporting adoption of technologies into remote area rangeland grazing .
34 NQ DRY TROPICS | YEAR IN REVIEW 2023-24