Thanks for having me over Fleur!

Stella Makes Good by Lisa Heidke

Stella Makes Good came together fairly easily for me.

Firstly, there was a piece in the local paper about a raid on a swinger’s party in the next suburb. At the time, I read it and thought, wow! Swingers? Just up the road from me? Imagine if you accidentally turned up there expecting a normal party and instead saw your local butcher dressed in dominatrix gear and the local school’s headmaster wearing a nappy and being lead around on a dog lead? My imagination went into overdrive!

A couple of months later, I was having New Year’s drinks with girlfriends at a local pub – and like Stella and her friends, by the time we caught up, it was almost the end of January. One of my friends asked everybody what their New Year’s mantras were, and we collectively groaned.

But again, it got me thinking, what a great way to begin a novel…making New Year’s resolutions, having defining mantras for the new year…most of us do it…usher in the positive and wipe the slate clean from the previous year.

When I combined the two thoughts, they formed the basis of Stella Makes Good – the rest I made up as I went along.

From the beginning, I knew I wanted the story to be set over one week – I love packing as much drama as I can into a short amount of time – and when you think about it, seven days is quite long. It’s time enough to fall in love, realise you’re married to an adulterer, fail exams, lose a job, win your dream promotion, die…really, anything can happen in a week…and most life changing events happen in a split second.

What if something you knew to be true, turned out to be false? A lie? I believe life turns on a five cent piece…circumstances…and realities can change in the blink of an eye, and often do.

As with my previous three novels, I wrote the main character, Stella, in first person…and then I thought I’d be super clever by writing the three secondary characters in first person as well! So for twelve months or thereabouts, I worked on the first couple of drafts, going back every now and then to layer characters and plotlines.

Because Stella was the anchor, I wanted her to have the least problems, but after the first draft when I reread her story, I thought, ‘apart from being a librarian and a decent mother, you’re a bore’ so I added a romantic interest for her and a mother in law she loved (perhaps a unique relationship – but I love writing about older women which inevitably I model on my mum and her friends).

I wasn’t plagued with demons so much because I really got into Stella’s story and treated her and her friends like real people. (Occupational hazard.)

However, I didn’t think her friends had enough problems so I kept adding to their angst. I wanted so much to add to their angst that I originally had one of the main characters die, but then when I thought about it, I realised I didn’t want that. I didn’t want any of the characters to take the easy way out. Life is tough and you have to deal with it.

That’s not to say that Stella Makes Good is not a hopeful story but those four women – Stella, Jesse, Carly and Louisa – have one hell of a traumatic week!

When I finished Stella’s story, I was quietly confident it would fly and was happy with the four characters all speaking in first person with their own voice…then I got the structural edit back. All twelve pages of it!

Being me, I stomped and cried.  The gist of the report was that Stella’s first person was fine but the other three needed to be rewritten in third person. Rewritten being the operative word…I was being asked to do a major rewrite. Far out!

Though I was on a deadline, I called (I think I may have texted) and said, ‘I can’t look at this for at least a week. I need time to digest. It’s basically a rewrite.’

I think then she might have texted back ten minutes later and said something along the lines of ‘suck it up princess’.

Rather than be juvenile and engage in a text fight, I rang and swore at her – we have an open relationship.

Anyway, after I calmed down, I could see the editor’s point and although it was a bit (!) of work, I believe that Stella Makes Good is a much better book because of the changes that were suggested to me.

And that’s about it. Stella Makes Good went through some major rewrites but that’s what you do when you’re a pantser like me and have no idea where your story is heading! You start with an idea and fly by the seat of your pants.

Lisa Heidke, author of Stella Makes Good

I love Stella and her friends…I just wouldn’t want to spend a week in their shoes!

www.lisaheidke.com

Twitter: @lisaheidke

Thanks Fleur; I’m not sure I qualify for your farmer blog, I fall into the hobby farmer category more than the real farmer, but here goes:

1. Summary of your family and farming enterprise

I have a ten acre block of mostly Lantana (noxious weed in Qld) where I run some dairy cattle.

John Beesley aka @Beeso tackling Lantana Land

I hand milk and make my own raw milk cheese. At the moment that is done for free for mates while I slowly fence and clear Lantana-Land!

The ultimate goal is to turn it into a cooking school on steroids, where you can learn the way and where of primary produce and why fresh is best before cooking simple food that tastes great.

John Beesley's Lantana-Land

I have a wife Vanessa, an epidemiologist cancer researcher and a newborn son Curtis.

Lantana-land is also intended as bit of a legacy for him, as I don’t want my kids to grow up thinking that vegetables comes from an aisle in a supermarket and milk comes in a plastic container.

2. Why I farm

The best thing is without doubt the fresh raw milk and cheese. So creamy!

Raw Milk Cheese by John Beesley

3. What do you foresee as the biggest short term and long term challenges in farming?

My biggest challenge is infrastructure and the money it costs. I shudder to think what fencing, real fencing costs on a large farm.

Long term the challenge will to be to build a sustainable business out of the farm.

Lantana-Land Dairy Cows

5. What do you wish non-farmers / city people & the Australian Government 
understood about farming?

Well, working in Brisbane I think I am a city person! But the disconnect between what farmers grow and get paid and what the big two get on the supermarket shelf is amazing.

The government really needs to do something to allow competition to grow, so that farmers can go back to growing the best food, not the cheapest.

John Beesley – aka @Beeso

www.lantanaland.blogspot.com

John is Farmer story No. 5 in my commitment to feature 52 farming stories for the Australian Year of the Farmer.

Purple Roads by Fleur McDonald

I’ve been hanging out to show you the cover for Purple Roads and here it is! Isn’t it beautiful? Lisa White, one of the amazing Allen and Unwin designers, has excelled herself, once again.

There is also a book trailer to whet your which you can take a look at here: 

Click here to view the embedded video.

April 2 is release day but like I said previously, you may see it in shops a week or so before hand.

BLURB: When Anna and Matt finally buy their dream farm, their struggles aren’t quite over. First it’s patchy rain and poor crops, then Matt has an accident … and even when the heavens finally open all might yet be lost. An exciting new novel full of romance and mystery from the author of the bestselling Red Dust and Blue Skies.

Anna and Matt Butler were childhood sweethearts with a dream of owning their own land, a dream they achieved through hard work and determination.
But as the seasons conspire against them and Matt is involved in a terrible accident, the couple face financial ruin and the loss of their farm.
As they fight for everything they hold dear, they suddenly find themselves caught up in events much bigger and more dangerous than they could ever have imagined.
Purple Roads is a story about maintaining faith in yourself, staying true to your ideals and, most of all, the belief that some things are worth fighting for.

You are able to pre-order Purple Roads from Booktopia ( www.booktopia.com.au ) if you would like other online bookstores.

Firstly I would like to thank Fleur McDonald for giving me this opportunity to share my story and congratulate her for taking the lead in Australian Year of the Farmer by sharing 52 farmers’ stories.

For too long food has been about cooking and eating and recipes and restaurants. it’s time for everyone in the food value chain to follow Fleur’ s lead and put faces to product and give our customers real farmers they can relate to.

1. Summary of your family and farming enterprise

My name is Lynne Strong and I farm at Clover Hill Dairies in partnership with my husband Michael and son Nick in what I refer to as paradise – the beautiful Jamberoo valley on the South Coast of NSW.

Jamberoo is the birth place of the Australian dairy industry and the cooperative movement and my family has been farming here for 180 years.

I am actively involved in the day to day running of our two dairy farms where we milk 500 cows that produce milk to supply over 50,000 Australians daily.

The highlight of my farming journey to date has been winning the National Landcare Primary Producer Award.  This award recognises farmers who have a holistic view of farming and are committed to achieving the delicate balance between sustainable and profitable food production, and the health and wellbeing of people, animals and the planet.

Michael and Lynne Strong of Clover Hill Dairies

2. Why I farm

• I farm because the people I care about most in the world farm and they are in it for the long haul
• I farm because I believe feeding, clothing  and housing the world is the  noblest profession
• I farm because I like the mental intensity, the constant review process, the drive to get up each day and do it better. The fulfilling challenge of balancing productivity, people, animals and the planet
• I farm because inspirational people farm. Feeding, clothing and housing the world now and in the next 50 years is going to require an extraordinary effort. This means we need extraordinary people to take up the challenge. When I work with inspirational people, they light my fire, feed my soul and challenge me to continue to strive to make a unique contribution to agriculture and the community.I want farming men and women to go out and sell the message that feeding and clothing the world is an awesome responsibility and a noble profession

3. What do you foresee as the biggest short term and long term challenges in farming?

Sadly Australia is complacent about the challenges to food security. There is a lack of appreciation by society in general of the interdependence of environment, agriculture, food and health.

However if we are to progress and fuel the mushrooming food needs of the cities while meeting the community’s expectations for environmental sustainability and animal well-being, then both rural and urban communities must have greater mutual empathy and respect.

This I believe is the real challenge facing farmers in the immediate future -How do we fix it?

As I see it we can do one of two things. We (farmers) can sit back and lament that we are victims or we can actively acknowledge that farmers are business people selling a product and successful businesses recognise marketing is a strategic part of doing business.

Marketing doesn’t mean every farmer needs to have a logo, spend money on advertising, write a marketing plan, write a blog, join Twitter or Facebook – it simply means being customer focused. This means you have to understand your customer and their values and your business has to BE the image you want your customer to see. Then whenever you get a chance, put that image out there. It may be at the farmgate, at a local farmers market, a community meeting, a media interview or whenever you are in contact with consumers.

Clover Hill Dairies

Every sector of the food system whether they be farmers, manufacturers, branded food companies, supermarkets or restaurants is under ever increasing pressure to demonstrate they are operating in a way that is consistent with stakeholder values and expectations. Farmers cannot expect to be exempted from this scrutiny just because we grow the food.

Businesses are built on relationships. This means we (farmers) have to get out there in our communities and start having two way conversations with our customers

Excitingly I know that once farmers embrace the concept they will discover like me that it can be very rewarding talking to your customers. They are interested and they do care.

There are so many ways farmers can share their stories. To help achieve this I initiated the innovative ‘Art4Agriculture’ programs which started with Picasso Cows and is now the Archibull Prize.  The Archibull Prize uses art and multimedia to engage thousands of students in learning about the valuable role farmers play in Australia’s future.

With the Art4Agriculture team I am working on establishing an Australia wide network of ‘young agricultural champions’ who are trained to tell the great story of Australian agriculture to the next generation of consumers – students.

This program connects young people from different food and fibre industries. They get to see their similarities, they find common ground, they realise each has issues that are just as challenging, and they learn how they can help each other.

Art4Agriculture’s Young Farming Champions program for 2012 will train a team of 24 young farmers from regional Australia to actively engage with students in schools around Australia. The students will focus on a particular food or fibre industry, receive a unique insight from their Young Farming Champion and then enter their project work (their Archie) to vie for the  ‘Archibull Prize’.

Our Young Farming Champions will also have the opportunity to participate in a comprehensive and diverse array of initiatives offered by our supporting partners. These events will provide a platform from which to develop, build and strengthen the capacity of the Young Farming Champions and allow primary industries to develop key farmer-to-stakeholder and farmer-to-consumer relationships.

Through their involvement in Art4Agriculture school programs our Young Farming Champions will be able to directly market their food or fibre industry and its diverse career pathways to a captive and relevant audience. The legacy of the Young Farming Champions program is to create an Australia wide network of enthusiastic young professionals and build their capacity to promote Australian agriculture as a dynamic, innovative, rewarding and vibrant industry.

We believe this program will not only help build the capability of young rural people to farm with resilience and confidence it will provide a great platform to spark the next generations’ interest in an agricultural career.

Nick Strong of Clover Hill Dairies

4. What is my vision for the future?

My vision for the future isn’t too difficult; it just requires a different way of thinking. I believe a profitable and sustainable healthy future for the farming sector is achievable – the health and welfare of all Australians and many people around the world depends on it.

To drive the process of change requires champions and leaders. But to change grass roots perceptions, we need grass roots action. Farmers care about the country, their livestock and the people they provide with food and fibre. Beyond best farming practices, farmers have to be out in communities, walking the talk – from paddock to plate, from cow to consumer – and building trust between rural and urban communities. I want farming men and women to go out and sell the message that feeding and clothing the world is an awesome responsibility and a noble profession, and that it offers great careers. Just imagine if we could achieve my vision of an Australia-wide network of trained, passionate farmers talking directly with the communities they supply!

5. What do you wish non-farmers / city people & the Australian Government 
understood about farming?

Australian farmers proudly feed and clothe 60 million people. If they were doctors or nurses or pharmacists or ambulance officers or firemen there would be a moment in most people’s lives when they would be reminded just how important those professions are.
But farmers, at less than 1 per cent of the Australian population, are almost invisible and with food in abundance in this country, there is little opportunity to remind Australians just how important our farmers are.
I am hoping Australian Year of the Farmer starts a very long conversation and a new appreciation for the land that produces our food and the hands that grow it.

Billboard – across Sydney Harbour Bridge with this imagery:

If you want safe, affordable, nutritious food forever love the land that produces it and the hands that grow it

You can visit us at the following websites

Clover Hill Dairies www.cloverhilldairies.com.au

Art4agriculture www.art4agriculture.com.au

Read our blogs at

Clover Hill Dairies Diary  http://chdairiesdiary.wordpress.com/

Art4agriculturechat http://art4agriculturechat.wordpress.com

Follow us on twitter: @chdairies and @art4ag

Follow us on Facebook

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Clover-Hill-Dairies/211850082224503

http://www.facebook.com/art4agriculture/

You can find links to our Flickr, Slideshare and YouTube accounts on our websites as well as my email address.  Looking forward to hearing from you.

I feel sick.

I’ve got butterflies and the shakes. And on top of all that, I’m nervous (and a worrier!).

The sun sets on my new book, Purple Roads

Purple Roads is heading to the printers on Monday. That’s it. Done. Finished. There’s nothing more I, nor my editor, can do. The sun has set on this journey.

I get like this any time I release a book – oh except perhaps for Red Dust. I’m not sure I understood what releasing my work into the world of critics, reviewers and readers actually meant then. I sure as hell do now.

I’m probably going to be slightly hard to live with, as April 2 grows closer. Of course I’ll do my best not to be, but every time the email ‘pings’ with a new message, or the phone rings, I’ll jump and open/answer them with fear grinding in my stomach.

It might be a review.

I still haven’t held the book in my hand yet – hopefully sometime over the next three weeks I’ll get to do that. I know when I do, I’ll probably cry. I’ve poured my heart and soul into Purple Roads and as I’ve mentioned before, it was written through a difficult period for our family. (Silver Gums is being written under the same pressure and it’s something I’ve learnt to deal with).

So now it’s all done it’s just up to you guys. I’ll be looking forward (I think) to your thoughts, when it does hit the shelves. And please, do let me know.

The release date is April 2 but often books can be found in shops a few days earlier, so you may see it around the end of March.

We’re just putting together the publicity schedule and as soon as I know where I’m heading, I’ll be letting you all know!

Rochelle and Meita

So for me now, I’m off to enjoy the rest of the school holidays with the kids and help in the feedlot. I’m looking forward to that!

Maybe if I’m really lucky, I’ll get some beach time.

Esperance at it's most beautiful

Fleur McDonald's to-be-read pile

Do you love going to a movie and being taken into another world? Do you get so caught up in the action on the screen, you jump at every explosion, cry at every kiss or nod your understand every time a teenage girl yells at her mum? I do.

I do it with books too. In fact, if I am truly entrenched in a book, someone could talk to me and I won’t hear them. Losing myself in an imaginary world, where I can listen to every shout and see every scene in my head – almost as a mini movie – is a precious gift.

My parents gave me this gift and it truly is the present which keeps on giving. They encouraged me to read in bed before I went to sleep, in car as we were driving the three hours to Adelaide, or even at the top of the Willow tree, which was favourite place to read, because I thought I was at the top of the Faraway tree! I received books for Christmas, for birthdays and often my dad, who travelled away regularly, would bring me a book on his return home. (The first book I can remember was The Famous Five, Treasure Island – read its story here.)

The only exception was when I was sent to bed and mum came down to check on me. If I was reading under the covers, she’d take my book away – can’t tell you how upsetting that was! (My daughter does it now and I have to be stern with her, but inside I’m laughing and loving the fact she is so absorbed in the story, she can’t put it down.)

I’m always curious to see what people are readings so, as I’m a friend of The National Year of Reading I’m putting a call out to see peoples “to-be-read” piles. Mine is quite large – I’ve just pulled out a few to show you. (Oh and there’s another funny story; I asked a friend if she would take a photo of her pile and she asked if she could take a photo of her whole bookshelf!)

The top photo is my to-be-read pile. You’ll see a couple of YA books in there – my daughter often asks me to read her books, if she’s either a bit unsure of the story line or she thinks I’ll enjoy it. I’m happy to oblige – I still go back and re-read the Famous Five and my other favourite books, from childhood. Do you?)

Over the next few months, I’m going to show you some people’s piles and the reason they have these books waiting to be read. (If you ‘d like to be involved, please email me at author at fleurmcdonald dot com)

Gabi Cumming is first to share her pile!

“I am a very patriotic Aussie and take every opportunity I can to absorb our unique culture, customs and characters. My reading is very Aussie and I swing from fact to fiction. I love to read true life stories of our outback pioneers and the difficulties they faced but I also love to read current accounts of how our bushies continue to fight against the elements. We also run a wildlife Shelter (because our animals are so unique and special) so I always have at least reference book in my pile – I never seem to know enough!”

Gabi Cumming's to-be-read pile

By the way, did you know 46% of Australian reading age don’t have enough literacy skills to function on a literacy level . They can’t read every day things like a newspaper or instructions on a medicine bottle. (info got from The West Aust newspaper). Let’s see what this year can achieve to help reduce this number!

What are you reading at the moment and how big is your to-be-read pile?

 Introducing

1. Summary of your family and farming enterprise

My Family started in the Flinders Ranges, and then in 1959 my Mum moved to the NT as a School of the Air Governess.

She loved the Red Centre so her and Dad purchased Bond Springs Station in the early 60’s. Bond Springs Station is 30km out of Alice Springs.

I have 3 siblings, we all schooled on the School of the Air on Bond Springs.

My wife Laura and son Joe remain on Bond Springs Station and run Poll Hereford cattle.

Ben, Joe & Lauren at Bond Springs Station, NT

2. For you, what is the best lifestyle factor that you enjoy as a farmer?

I love working in the bush fresh air hard work and gaining skills including Truck Road-Train driving, heavy machine operating, welding, live stock handling and many more skills needed to operate a cattle station.

Bond Springs Station

3. What do you foresee as your biggest short term and long term challenges 
in farming?

Drought is a constant battle understanding the elements, scaling, operating costs, the Labor Government, Aboriginal shire taxs, carbon taxs and basically the Labor Government who do not support or assist private enterprise.

Bushfire on Bond Springs Station, NT

4. What do you wish non-farmers / city people & the Australian Government 
understood about farming. What message would you like to put on a billboard 
in Collins Street?

I’d like to see the billboard in Canberra, our Nations Capital.

I believe the population needs to understand living on the land means we all need to be totally self sufficient; all jobs from plumbing to mechanics to fencing and live stock we do ourselves.

I think the Indonesian live export ban was a short-sighted mistake by the government.

They need to understand there was only a few abattoirs operating under Indonesian style/Hulla Slaughter, there were abattoirs operating correctly, the ban has sent many stations broke.

It’s affected industries outside of core cattle businesses, including service jobs such as trucks, helicopters, cafes, road houses that have gone down the tube.

Love and Other U-Turns by Louisa Deasey

Risk

New York was on my turning 30 list, along with writing a book.

In October 2007 I was 30 + 6 months and I’d done neither. The prods were getting stronger – not least of which was an ironically-titled writing commission; ‘Things to Try Before You Die’. It was big – 5000 words – and it paid the most I’d ever received from one commission. So on the Thursday when I was paid, I promptly spent the entire thing on a return flight to New York which left the following Tuesday.

At that point, I had some weekly columns with a newspaper, and a few regular feature writing gigs, so I knew I’d be able to earn money when I got there, which made me feel (slightly) better about having a grand sum of about $800 left in my account to take for spending money. But this is the thing; if you wait for everything to be perfect before you take a leap, you’ll never jump. I was petrified, but exhilarated too.

New York was overwhelmingly fun, scary, frightening, illuminating, and weird. I made a lot of mistakes; I accidentally stayed in a Harlem hostel and had to sleep in a t-shirt despite sub-zero temperatures and snow outside, the clanging radiator set on sauna and the Spanish-speaking ‘Super’ unable to understand me.

I stumbled head-first over a rat the size of a small wallaby while lost in the Projects one night and got retrieved from the pavement by some (thankfully) friendly rappers. I got invited to a party with Cindy Lauper, I went dancing with a bunch of strangers in the meat-packing district, I accidentally sneezed on Billy Crystal while queuing for a Broadway ticket, and I got drunk on one glass of wine in a rotating bar where the view changed every few minutes. And of course, I sent lots emails with all of this to my friends and family (well, I didn’t mention Harlem, dancing or the Projects to my mum).

Email

Then one day, I received an out-of-the blue email from a major Australian publisher who’d read some of these emails (forwarded from a friend), asking if I felt like pitching her a book on my exploits.

I’d only been in New York for three weeks, but how often does an opportunity like this arise? After momentarily falling off my chair, I holed up at the New York Public Library for two days and had three sample chapters and a synopsis to the Publisher by the Monday. The pitch was along the lines of ‘Australian girl takes Manhattan’ complete with shopping, New York quips, and plenty of dating references to safely slot it into Carrie Bradshaw territory. It sort of made me feel a bit ill to write, which is never a good sign, but it’s what I thought she wanted, what I thought would sell, what I thought everyone wanted to read.

After I returned to Melbourne, the Publisher got back to me with her feedback; she liked my writing style, but didn’t think there was enough plot to sustain a whole book.

I was quietly relieved.

Louisa Deasey, Author of Love and Other U-Turns

Writing

By then I knew that despite desperately wanting to write a book, I didn’t want it to be any book. I didn’t want to write what someone else wanted me to write. Articles are different; short reporting doesn’t ask you to mine the depths of your psyche. But to live with a 100, 000 word story in your head and your heart for months, perhaps years, you need to love it.

So I kept it a secret.

In mid  2008, I started secretly working on what was to become Love and Other U-Turns. I started by writing an intention for the book, which served as an anchor every time I felt myself swimming in tangents and possibilities of where the story could go.

I wrote before I’d spoken to anyone each day, piecing the story together from journal entries, emails, and phone calls to Jim. Here I learned an interesting lesson for me; finding your voice can take awhile, but once you’ve found it, the writing flows.

In the beginning, Jim was the only person I told about the book. I didn’t want others’ fears, expectations and doubts to come into it. And besides, it was really just for me anyway. This was my big goal, my lifelong wish, it wasn’t something that I expected or needed anyone else to understand. I was going to do it anyway. Why complicate that with others’ expectations? Eventually, though, when I was almost at my first draft, I told some close friends and my family. I couldn’t really keep it a secret any more as I was in that crazy writing world where you think its Tuesday and its Saturday. And I hadn’t left the house for weeks.

Love

I know it sounds corny, and many people say you need discipline to write, but for me, it’s more about love. Discipline is easy if you love what you’re doing.

Think about when you’re in love; no matter how hard (or insane) it looks to the outside world, you don’t really care what other people say, you look forward to every day, your life takes on this magical, synchronistic tone. I’ve heard athletes speak the same way about running races. How to go faster, they must ‘relax’.

I wrote Love & Other U-Turns every day for about 7 weeks, until I had a first draft of about 110, 000 words. Then I left it for a month or so and started editing and re-writing. That whole process took about five months, and by 2009 I had a book contract.

In 2010, Love and Other U-Turns was published, spine and everything, and I still marvel that something that started in my head is now a tangible, physical, thing.

If I had to give one tip on writing a book, it’s to fall in love with the story you want to tell.

Let it coax you out of bed like a secret friend, waiting to be met.

And chase it onto the page, as fast as you can.

Thank you for being this week’s Guest Blogger Louisa! You can find out more about Louisa and her book, Love and Other U-Turns on her website: www.louisadeasey.com

Introducing

1. Summary of your family and farming enterprise

My name is Angus Whyte I live with my wife Kelly and 8 year old son Mitchell at “Wyndham”, a 12,500ha pastoral property on the Anabranch River 85km north of Wentworth NSW.  We consider ourselves “graziers”, in that we turn plants into money through livestock and we don’t mind what sort of livestock we run.

Gus & Mitchell Whyte

Currently we have 320 Santa/Droughtmaster heifers joined to Angus bulls, 1500 merino ewes that are being joined to either Merino or White Suffolk rams, 900 merino lambs and 600 Dorper ewes that are on agistment here, by the time you read this we may have bought more stock as our number are very “fluid” and change with the amount of feed available.

We also have some freshwater lake beds that are filled by the Anabranch River in flood that we can crop on receding floodwaters; this is very simple cropping that even we can do, in that you put a seed in, it grows and then you harvest it, no chemical or fertilizer required.  Currently these lakes are full and with another flow coming down the river cropping may be a couple of years away yet as it normally takes about 18 months for the lakes to dry up.

Our farming passion revolves more around the management of the land and the restoration of more species and better water use efficiency, unfortunately the only way we can get paid is by selling livestock/fibre, having said that if we were identified and managed for conservation our management would be exactly the same.

My Mother and Father live on another property about 20km north of us called “Willow Point” and we help them running that property as well, that is where I grew up and my passion for farming was nurtured.

Our attitude to farming is simply to work with nature rather than against, so we no longer have weeds, we have “plants with stories” that we can learn from and our aim is to make our business simple and our ecosystem extremely complex, the more complex the better.

We see that by running stock in large mobs normally > 2,000dse’s (dry sheep equivalents) this allows us to prune the plants and then also allow those plants adequate rest to re-grow, as we are 100% responsible for our ecosystem if we are seeing an increase in undesirable plants then it is something in our management that is inviting them in.

Our management system is unique to Wyndham and has developed over the 10 years since we embarked on this change, it certainly results in much less work and seems to deliver good on ground results.

We have plenty of people that have helped us along the way and they still support us to this day, Principle Focus first opened our eyes to the possibilities ( http://www.principlefocus.com.au/ ).  Then we needed more skills to manage our livestock so Grahame Rees and Low Stress Stock handling helped out (http://www.lss.net.au/), we found out about KLR marketing (http://www.klrmarketing.com.au/)  through Grahame and that has helped us deliver a better return on our livestock dollar while making sure we don’t over sell our grass.

I’m sure that anyone that goes through a significant change has to have plenty of support and we have been very lucky to have lots of great people in our corner.

Wyndham Station via Wentworth NSW




2. For you, what is the best lifestyle factor that you enjoy as a farmer?

Definitely the ability to spend a lot of time with your family, this includes working with your partner in the business and as we live a long way from a school the ability to have a positive input into Mitchell’s education by teaching him through the wonderful School of the Air (Broken Hill).  We also enjoy the closeness to “Mother Nature” that managing land allows, added to this the working with livestock and we have some wonderful gifts that we enjoy.  We also have the ability to produce most of our own delicious food with home killed meat, vegies straight out of the garden (with only a bit of water added!) and the wonderfully quite peaceful times spent listening to the most beautiful wild birds and animals.




3. What do you foresee as your biggest short term and long term challenges 
in farming?

I see the tug-a-war between Food security vs Riverine health v health of land and people as being the biggest issue.

My opinion is that we need to focus on all of the issues rather than try and work on one in isolation, they certainly are all linked.  If we put more focus on “rain fed” agriculture using bio-diverse pastures to grow more animal products with the waste used to grow vegies this would address a number of these issues, I know it doesn’t sound life changing, it certainly could be.  With my background in Catchment/river management I think that we need to look very closely at all river and Floodplain management more so than just trying to manage the Murray-Darling basin to a number rather than “listening” to the rivers needs.




4. What do you wish non-farmers / city people & the Australian Government 
understood about farming. What message would you like to put on a billboard 
in Collins Street?

If you would like to eat healthy food, make friends with a farmer.

You can connect with Gus on Twitter @GusWhyte

Jessica Rudd author of Ruby Blues and Campaign Ruby

As the first guest blogger for 2012 I’m over the moon to have the witty and gorgeous Jessica Rudd. You can follow her on Twitter  @Jess_Rudd or on Facebook here.

Jess, 27, had three career changes in as many years—law, PR, politics—but is now going steady with her life as a writer. She hopes Ruby Blues, sequel to Campaign Ruby, will give her readers as many laughs as she had writing it. Jessica is based in Beijing.

Jessica:

In 2009, when the arse fell out of the economy, I was living with my husband in London. My day job was to help insolvency practitioners deal with the media when overseeing the clean-up of massive corporate collapse.

At that stage I was a writer, but a writer of press statements. I sat in a loud, busy office drinking terrible coffee and adrenaline and pumping out material for clients. It gave me a buzz, but it was miserable work trying to serve bad news sunny-side up.

My husband was—is—an investment banker. He was working in the city watching countless colleagues—both in his firm and others—take those dreaded phone calls from HR in what were being described as the various phases of “headcount control”. Headcount control is French for firing people.

It was a worrying time, the first such worrying time for our generation.  We lived in trendy Notting Hill, the land of soy -sipping yummy mummies pushing chic prams with yoga-toned triceps.

Our tiny one-bedroom flat with a polka dot rug cost us an unutterable amount of Sterling. Two blocks down was the travel bookshop from the movie. Hugh Grant did not work there. Pity.

As the financial crisis worsened, the once lady-zone cafes of Portobello Road became sausage fests. Soon we saw them filled with men, heads buried in the jobs pages of the FT, whose casual wardrobes only comprised the loud floral board shorts they wore to Barbados or the après-ski cashmere their nannies packed for Aspen.

Campaign Ruby by Jessica Rudd

For sale signs cluttered once neat streets. Oversized four-wheel drives disappeared in favour of cute hatchback get-abouts. Glossy magazines once oozing with luxury items now embraced boho and vintage. The highstreet grunted under the weight of closing down sales. Newspapers kept running tallies of redundancy announcements—a hundred, a thousand, a hundred thousand. Yoga studios shut up shop and yummy mummies gave up Botox cold turkey at the most severe wrinkle-etching moment of their lives.

We were keen to get out of there. Immediately. So when Albert was given the chance to move to the Beijing office, we grabbed it and started packing.

But what was I supposed to do in Beijing? My Mandarin was limited so that ruled out the communications industry. I considered returning to the legal profession for about three seconds before recalling my reasons for leaving it. So where did that leave me?

Mum, who was in London on business, took me out for champagne. Afterwards we went for a spot of window-shopping on New Bond Street. In the dark after closing time we peered at exquisite shoes in glamorous but dim windows with tiny, discrete ‘sale’ signs in the corner.

‘What am I going to do in China, Mum?’ I asked.

She turned to me and said, ‘just write something.’

Write something? What?

But as we signed the papers to terminate the lease, booked flights and arranged visas, someone began to bloom in my mind.

Her name was Ruby Stanhope. She was a Londoner, an investment banker. Her voice was loud and her character vivid. She had a story too. She had lost her job, guzzled far too much pinot noir and booked herself a non-refundable ticket to Australia where she met Luke Harley, chief of staff to the leader of the opposition. The prime minister was ousted, an election was called and Ruby was asked to work on the campaign.

It felt right. Now all I had to do was put it on paper.

We arrived in Beijing and I insisted that we find an apartment with a beautiful study. Somewhere with views, natural light, a charming desk and the latest laptop. I would be like Carrie Bradshaw.

My loving husband found said apartment. It was perfect. So on day one I made tea in my favourite pot. I put fresh pink peonies in a clear glass vase. I wore comfortable but stylish clothes. I stared out at the peaked roofs of Beijing, opened my laptop and listened for Ruby’s voice.

The cursor blinked. So did I. Nothing came.

Shit, I thought. I’ve told all my friends and family that I’m going to write a novel and now I’m going to be one of those people who tells everyone they’re going to write a novel but never does. Shit. Shit, shit, shit.

Panic shook me. I drank more tea. The caffeine didn’t help. I’ll put on a load of washing, I thought. Leave it for a bit and then come back to it. I did a lot of washing that week. In fact I did a lot of washing in those few months.

Mum called.

‘How are you settling in, darling?’

‘Well thanks.’

‘How’s the writing going?’

‘Fine. Excellent.’

‘Wonderful. I can’t wait to read it.’

Shit.

I watched a lot of TV, most of which I couldn’t understand, but I kept watching to avoid doing what I was supposed to be doing. I went to the gym, sometimes twice a day. Albert was coming home to gourmet meals.

‘Wow, this must have taken you ages to cook, babe!’

‘Oh no, it was nothing.’ Subtext: three hours.

One day during a commercial break I was reading a magazine—Time Out Beijing. In it was a list of Beijing’s best cafes with wifi. One of them took my fancy. It was called Wain Wain—wain is the Japanese word for wine.

I had run out of washing so I figured I might as well get out of the house.

Weird with spectacular views and fast internet was how it had been described. It didn’t disappoint.

As my lift arrived on the thirty-fifth floor of the multi-purpose high rise on Beijing’s main strip I thought about turning back, but didn’t.

Terrible music greeted me. Smoking Japanese businessmen read manga over short fat espresso. Blue carpet, glass tables, pleather chairs and a white feathered light fixture—this wasn’t me. I ordered iced oolong tea with a teriyaki chicken bento box and plugged in my laptop. It was worth a shot.

And there was Ruby, loud and vivid as ever.

By the end of the day I was a chapter down and within eight months I was in my first draft of Campaign Ruby.

Ruby Blues By Jessica Rudd

I drank many, many litres of oolong tea that year learned a lot about myself as a writer. I am not Carrie Bradshaw. I need noise. I need to be around people in order write people.

The best advice I can give budding writers is to find your comfortable place. Find what makes you function best. Not every writer is meant to retreat to her hushed garret. Nor is every writer suited to a room full of suited smokers. We are all different and we only find what works through trial, error and about a thousand loads of washing.