Services

Agriculture

Tonkin Agriculture and Soil Consulting offers a personalised service and independent advice about:

  • Soil quality and soil health
  • Crop and pasture nutrition
  • Soil biology
  • Practices to improve soil and treat soil problems
  • Increasing profits through improving soils
  • Treating degradation problems such as erosion, acidity and acidity .

This is available to individuals, groups or agribusiness.

You can find out about:

  • Group workshop or training sessions about soils. Content will be as specific or general as you like, and can be tailored to your district or enterprise. Soil samples can be collected and sent to the lab of your choice, and the results explained to you or your group.
  • One-on-one consultation about your soils, what are the strengths and weaknesses in your soils and how to improve them.
  • Tonkin Ag & Soil speaking at demonstrations, workshops, soil pit field days and other training and education events.
  • Planning or working on trials of new products or methods. This includes planning trials so that they answer the questions you have, reliably and with no bias towards suppliers or manufacturers.
  • Obtaining government grant funding for your group to enable running of trials – answer the questions about problem soils in your area! 
  • Purchasing new land – what are the soils like in this new paddock or area, and what do you need to know before signing the paperwork?
  • Irrigated enterprises – monitor salinity and nutrient levels, maintain soil health.
  • Using manures, composts or other alternative products – how do they fit in with your system, what are the benefits?
  • Use of waste products – effluent, wastewater, bio-solids, green waste compost – do they fit in with your system, monitoring and sampling for EPA requirements if needed. 
  • Literature reviews - information is collected, checked and summarised into a single easy to read document or fact sheet for you.
  • Other soils enquiries- see if Tonkin Agriculture and Soil Consulting can help! 

South Australian based, serving the Country

Government

Tonkin Agriculture and Soil Consulting is available for specialised consulting services to government departments. These services include:

  • Group workshop or training sessions about soils. Content will be as specific or general as required and can be tailored to specific districts or enterprises.  
  • Tonkin Ag & Soil speaking at demonstrations, workshops, soil pit field days and other training and education events 
  • Working with government staff on projects to supply soils expertise in sampling, monitoring or planning. Rebecca has extensive experience working with soil and agronomy field and lab trials. Examples include planning treatment of erosion sites, or assisting with sampling in field trials. 
  • Assessing land or soil suitability for development applications, waste water disposal, erosion or degradation risk, remediation or similar  
  • Surveys of land and soil condition or land use – Rebecca has experience using GPS logging software and entering data on ARCGis 
  • Soil, water or plant sampling to meet EPA, Carbon Sequestration or other statutory requirements 
  • Literature reviews - information is collected, checked and summarised into a single easy to read document or fact sheet for you 
  • Other soils enquiries- see if Tonkin Agriculture and Soil Consulting can help! 

Environment

  • Detailed soil characterisations with suitability reports for wastewater disposal, irrigation, cropping, horticulture and viticulture.
  • Soil sampling around SA and interstate. I have worked in partnership with environmental consultants to sample for EPA requirements, and to establish baseline soil characterisations in newly acquired soils for wastewater irrigation. I have carried out soil sampling for environmental monitoring in the Murray floodplain, and reported on trends in salinity and sodicity levels
  • I can assist other consultants by adding my soils expertise to their knowledge, to improve the outcome for the clients, and overcome constraints in soils and land management. I am also available to assist with field work and sampling.
  • Group workshop or training sessions about soils. Content will be as specific or general as required and can be tailored to specific districts or enterprises.  
  • Tonkin Ag & Soil speaking at demonstrations, workshops, soil pit field days and other training and education events 
  • Assessing land or soil suitability for development applications, waste water disposal, erosion or degradation risk, remediation or similar  
  • Surveys of land and soil condition or land use – Rebecca has experience using GPS logging software and entering data on ARCGis
  • Soil, water or plant sampling to meet EPA, Carbon Sequestration or other voluntary or statutory requirements
  • Literature reviews - information is collected, checked and summarised into a single easy to read document or fact sheet for you
  • I specialise in soil-related knowledge, but also have a lot of field experience in land management, plant nutrition, soil, water and plant sampling, and statistical analysis. 

Group Projects

Tonkin Agriculture and Soil Consulting has extensive experience in planning, implementing, monitoring and reviewing projects. Rebecca Tonkin has a PhD in Agriculture, and 15 years’ experience working for PIRSA in scientific trials and extension projects. That experience is now available to help industry, agribusiness, environment groups and farmer groups to investigate problems and find answers.

Projects may be large or small. Rebecca specialises in field trials that are relevant to farmers and use equipment and measurements that provide realistic conditions and results. 

Project services include:

  • Planning projects and trials
  • Budgeting and time line planning
  • Applying for funding 
  • Setting up trials
  • Monitoring soil, water, plants and animals
  • Statistical analysis of results 
  • Reporting 
  • Fact sheets
  • Presentation of results 
  • Publication of results 

Tonkin Ag & Soil can carry out as many or as few of the project operations as needed. Rebecca will work collaboratively with other groups to get the best result for the project.