The Agriculture Department is an outstanding feature of Beaudesert State High School. While it has turned out many students ready to move into the agricultural industry, many more simply love it for the opportunity to interact with nature in the fresh air and sunshine.
The department covers a large area and offers many different spaces.
Plants
We have a citrus orchard, paddocks, greenhouses, vegetable gardens, mango trees, dragon fruit plants, a hydroponics setup and a strawberry patch.
Students have the opportunity to propagate both food and ornamental plants, to observe mature fruit trees, to harvest food crops and to study pasture.
Animals
We have beef and dairy cattle, wool and meat sheep, and poultry.
Students take turns bottle-feeding young calves and sheep with milk, and older animals are fed pellets and hay. Students help with moving animals between paddocks or into the crush, and learn about growth rates and feed, ear-tagging, vaccination, health checks, de-sexing and artificial insemination.
We have our own poultry incubator and regularly hatch clutches of chicks from eggs produced by our own birds. Students handle the newborn chicks, and learn to check and top up food and water for the newborns, as well as the older poultry. They may clean out pens, measure out feed and weigh chicks to understand growth rates.
A number of our animals are award-winning, and every year students assist in the preparation and participation of our animals in local shows.
Our Agriculture Department also features a welding workshop, where students learn welding and thermal cutting.
We also have a department tractor, and select students have the opportunity to learn some of its mechanical features, as well as operating it.