A new collaborative research effort is helping the Bond family tackle the swathes of sodden and scalded soil - so-called 'seeps' - that have increasingly surfaced across their cropping country in South Australia's Murray Mallee region.

There, about 12 kilometres east of Mannum, the Bond brothers - Kevin and Geoff - and their co-workers Daryl Sparks and Brett Newman, have seen 12 seep-affected areas emerge on the family's 2960-hectare property in the past 20 years.

To date, the Bonds estimate the complex, permanent pattern of land degradation has claimed about 25ha of their farmland, in the vicinity of sandy hills and ridges, since they made the transition from mixed farming to continuous cropping in 1999.

This seep-affected farm area is relatively small, but its impact on logistics for paddock operations, such as seeding, spraying and harvesting, is significant.

Studying the seeps on the Bonds' property for the past four years as part of research funded by Natural Resources SA Murray-Darling Basin, Chris McDonough, from Insight Extension for Agriculture, has identified a link between continuous cropping and seep formation.

Mr McDonough says better chemical control of summer weeds as part of modern intensive cropping systems is one of three main factors contributing to seep development. The other two factors are rainfall and landscape (deep sands over impermeable clays).

Specifically, more effective chemical control means there are fewer summer weeds, particularly skeleton weed, on the Bonds' paddocks to intercept and absorb rainfall on the deep sands which form sand hills and ridges.

As a consequence, rainfall moves quickly down through the water-repellent sand until it hits an impermeable layer of clay in the soil's subsurface layers.

The result is a 'perched water table' that moves laterally through the soil, causing seeps to surface lower in the farming landscape in mid-slope areas and at the bottom of swales.

In these seep areas, the topsoil becomes waterlogged, leading to bare patches of surface soil and, eventually, saline scalds prone to wind erosion.

The Bonds are being helped to manage their seeps through a range of management strategies trialled on their property by Mr McDonough.

These strategies include twin-sowing summer grain crops - sorghum and millet - on seep-affected areas to help soak up excess water, provide protective ground cover and prevent surface salt accumulation.

For more information, read about the Bond’s seep-tackling tactics.