“Merrilong” near Spring Ridge has been home to the Brownhill family for more than six decades.

Now the location of the upcoming Australian Grower of the Year Field Day, the history of “Merrilong” and the Brownhills dates back to 1959 when a postponed land deal and a fateful gap year overseas marked the start of the family’s four-generation legacy on the Liverpool Plains.

In 1957, Gordon Brownhill Senior had sold up his property at Mudgee and was looking at “Merrilong” near Spring Ridge, New South Wales when his agent advised him to wait a year for the price to drop.

So, Gordon and his son David Brownhill Senior travelled to England in 1958 for a “gap year” which turned out to be a fortuitous trip in more ways than one.

“They were ahead of their time,” David Brownhill Junior joked.

“Luckily my dad went because he actually met mum and they ended up getting married, otherwise we wouldn’t be here and none of us would be talking about any of this.”

Not only did David Brownhill Snr meet his future wife Julia, but the agent’s advice turned out to be accurate, and the Brownhills purchased “Merrilong” in 1959 for 22 pounds an acre, eight pounds an acre less than the original price.

“It was on the market for 30 [pounds an acre], ended up selling for 22, which is equivalent to about 50 bucks an acre and now we’re standing on country that’s worth somewhere around the $8,000 an acre mark,” David said.

On 27 June 1959, Gordon and his wife Mary, along with their son David and his new wife Julia, moved to “Merrilong”, which at the time was predominantly sheep and cattle country.

Over the 1960s, Merrilong Pastoral Company began growing winter crops before adding summer crops, primarily sorghum, to the rotation when wheat quotas were introduced in the 1970s.

By the 1980s and ‘90s, David’s sons, Gordon and David, along with their wives Anne and Elizabeth, returned to the farm as David Snr’s interests moved into politics. From this time, the third generation of Brownhills managed the property, driving innovation and ultimately leading it to what it is today.

“Over that time, we’ve added more farms, we’ve had some grazing farms in between, we’ve sold some farms, but then we’ve focussed on dryland and irrigated cropping on the Liverpool Plains,” David said.

Gordon and David embraced no-tillage farming systems, reduced soil disturbance, and adopted new technologies to enhance weed control and crop production. Their approach blended productivity with soil conservation — aiming to make the enterprise economically successful while maintaining environmental stewardship in the process.

“The changes over the years have been extraordinary, from sheep and wool – we’ve got five woolsheds on the farm and we don’t use any of them – to now, we’re a fully integrated dryland and irrigated cropping system, all no-till,” David said.

“We’ve gone from traditional cultivation when we first started growing wheat to minimum till in the ‘80s for some sorghum. We mainly grew sorghum for the summer crops, a little bit of dryland corn and sunflowers - they were a big crop here back in the ‘80s when the crush plants were still here.

“Then we went into some irrigation, grew corn on irrigation and then we moved into seed crops which we used to call the poor man’s cotton.”

The Brownhills started growing irrigated and dryland cotton during a couple of trials in 2010 before adding it to their rotations commercially from 2011.

“This was a difficult place to grow cotton because the varieties were just a bit long and it’s cooler down here – it’s not prime cotton-growing country,” David said.

“But it’s been a great industry to be involved in and a great crop to be involved in.”

Today, “Merrilong” is a total of 10,700 hectares, comprising of 1,850ha of irrigation, 6,750ha of dryland farming and 2,100ha of grazing country.

The family enterprise continues with the fourth generation of Brownhills now operating under the Merrilong Agricultural Company (MAC) banner.

Gordon’s sons Hugh and Jock and David’s sons Oscar and Archie are actively involved in sustainable and diversified cropping across the property, covering both irrigated and dryland cotton as well as other broadacre grains on the land they manage.

Attendees of the Australian Cotton Grower of the Year Field Day will have the opportunity to learn more about the history of “Merrilong” first-hand during a farm tour of the property.

The Field Day will be held at “Gowrie”, 1226 Wilmott’s Road, Spring Ridge on Wednesday 18 March, featuring a line-up of guest speakers and a panel session with the Brownhill family, their advisory board and key consultants. Registrations are now open.