Farming in Australia

Australia is turning out to be a pretty expensive country, as was Japan.  To try to reduce my costs I joined a site called Helpx.  https://www.helpx.net It’s a website where people provide you room and board in exchange for a few hours work each day.  There are farms, homestays, ranches, lodges, B&Bs, hostels and even sail boats; all doing a variety of jobs.  For my first helpx, I chose a combination housesit and farm work.  The family of 6 lived in a rural area, near Aubrey in Victoria.  The family was going away for about 10 days and needed someone to look after the house, animals, and farm.  There would also be a young German couple staying.  Right up my alley I thought.  I couldn’t have asked for a better first gig. 

I arrived in the afternoon and the husband picked me up at the airport about 30 min away.  We had the nicest chat on the way home and I instantly liked him.  At one point we were talking about hunting.  He talked about being an avid hunter and I said I had no problem with ethical hunting, but I had no respect for trophy hunting. He was silent a moment and I explained I was talking about hunters who left the meat and only took the head.  Imagine my surprise when I got to my sleeping area and the room was filled with about 20 mounted deer heads!  They had cleverly arranged a book case in an upstairs family room.  The book case was several feet away from the wall with books on one side and a sheet on the other for privacy.  It was a cozy little nook and I actually really liked it.  The only problem were all the deer heads.   I’m so glad I clarified I was talking about trophy hunters who left the meat. I really had no issue with the mounted deer heads specifically, the problem was, they were in my way.  Getting out of bed each morning, I was literally face to face with one huge deer.  They looked more like elk in the US but I think they were mostly red deer.  Anyway, one deer in particular at the entrance to my space, I knocked into EVERYTIME I passed it.  You would think I would have learned to duck under it, but nope, I hit him every single time.   And wouldn’t you know, on my last morning, as it walked into him for the 100^th time, he finally came crashing down!  The kids jumped out of bed and came running, what happened, was I hurt.  Nope, the deer tried to escape.  Luckily, he wasn’t hurt; well, he was dead.  Nothing seemed broken and he was surprisingly light and I had no trouble putting him back where he belonged.  Had I known he was so light, I would have saved myself the trouble and just taken him down on day one. 

Kevin and Manja got there a few hours before and we all spent the evening getting to know each other.  What a delightful family!! They have four children ranging in age from 5 to 14.  The eldest daughter was the most poised and charming 14-year-old I’ve ever met and an absolute delight to talk to.  Also, a very talented artist and pianist.   The other children were also a lot of fun.  I actually spent quite a bit of time with the two youngest daughters, such sweet and adorable little girls!  As I’m not used to being around kids for any length of time, I was a bit hesitant, but I really enjoyed them.  I didn’t get a chance to talk very much with the young boy, but he was really nice too.  The family left at the crack of dawn the next day, so the 3 of us were on our own.  We had gotten a very brief rundown of our duties, but they had left us a very detailed set of instructions, which were very helpful.  We also had their father, and brother next door, they came to check on us often. 

Our duties were pretty easy really - feed and care for 2 very friendly Irish wolfhounds; a super friendly and typically ‘helpful’ cat; a big flock of geese; a few ducks; and 2 different flocks of chickens.  One group of chickens were mostly black and the others were fluffy.  We had to water a massive garden as well as 30 to 40 trees around the property.  There were other chores listed, pretty much what you would expect on a farm. They had an alpaca, but we didn't do anything with her and she was too shy to let me get near her.

Our first day alone we got to work bright and early.  There was a huge veggie garden and they had left us a long list of what was ready to harvest. The 3 of us walked around scratching our head, we couldn’t identify half of the plants and had no idea what to take!  We gathered up what we could identify and over the course of the next 10 days, identified and gathered more and more.  By the time the family came home, the walk-in refrigerator was filled with fresh produce.  They had about 10 huge tomato plants that for some reason wasn’t producing tomatoes, my favorite. That made me really sad.   Australia was in the middle of a heat wave and this day was horrible, somewhere between 40 and 45 (104 and 114).  Much too hot to even move around, much less do any work. We sat around the kitchen table and hung out.  Evening time came around and we went to do the evening chores.  Turn on all the water for the garden and trees, put the chickens up and tie up the dogs.  Apparently, the dogs liked to sneak off in the evening to go hunting.  The two types of chickens are let out on alternating days because they fight if they are together.  Today was the fluffy chicken’s day, and they were already in the pen.  We did have a bit of trouble finding all the water hoses, but eventually got them all turned on. We ended the day thinking, we got this!

The next day was thankfully much cooler and we got a lot more work done.  Kevin and Manja focused on cleaning out and weeded the veggie garden and I decided to tackle the job of mulching all the trees.  First, they all had to be weeded, then a layer of newspaper, then manure, and finally topped off with mulch.  OMG, this was hard work!  I actually like weeding, but with so many trees and the heat, it took about 5 min to realize I would probably die out there.  But I’m nothing if not determined, so I made sure I had plenty of water and just worked slow, with plenty of breaks.  By the end of our stay, all the trees were weeded and all but about 10 had mulch.  And I was alive.  My knees did give me a bit of trouble, but for the most part they cooperated.  When I needed a break from the physical work, I did some organizing, my other favorite project.  I cleaned out and organized a garden shed, 2 refrigerators, and the kitchen cabinets. 

As day 2 drew to a close, we went to get the chicken in, the black ones this time.  They were not so easy and by the end, we hated them!  First they tried to blend in with the geese.  Good trick!  We finally got them separated but they ran in different directions.  A few went in the pen, a few others kept running in with the geese and the rooster ran into some high grass.  No way were we going in there, there are deadly snakes here.  We probably chased these stupid chickens for 45 min before we got everyone penned up but the rooster, who was still hiding in the high grass. At this point, we were OK with him being eaten overnight, but we though the family wouldn’t be too happy as they seemed fond of the chickens.  We decided to give it a rest and go tie up the dogs, and try again later.  Back at the house, the dogs were no where to be found.  Oh great, right off the bat we’ve lost 2 dogs and a rooster.  Eventually we did get the rooster back with his ladies, but the dogs were just plain gone.  Nothing we could do, hopefully they wouldn’t get hurt and would be back by morning. 

Day 3, no dogs.  We didn’t want to call the family; nothing they could do really, so we called next door.  The brother showed up and said he’d come back over after work and go look for them on the four-wheeler if they weren’t back.  They had most likely gone up in the hills, where they liked to hunt kangaroos.  The kids had told us one dog once came back with her chest slashed open from a fight with a kangaroo, so we were really worried something had happened.  Since we had no idea where they had gone, there was nothing we could do, so we just went about our chores.  By early afternoon the dogs had come home; very hungry, very dirty and very tired.  We were so relieved!

Kevin and Manja were vegan so they did a lot of the cooking.  Sometimes I substituted chicken for their tofu or just ate what they were having.  I did make us a big stir fry, it seemed an obvious choice with so many fresh veggies to add.  One day we decided to try and make 2 batches of banana bread, one vegan (no eggs or milk) and one regular.  We couldn’t use the stove inside, something I discovered AFTER making the bread, so we decided to give the BBQ a try.  We fired it up, put the 2 bread pans on, closed the lid and waited.  And waited.  And waited.  I’m really not sure why it took so long, according to the temp gage, it was the same as the stove would be.  Rowen came over and hung out with us while we waited.  The vegan one finished first and much to my surprise, it looked and tasted about the same.  With no eggs, I thought it would be different, but it was fine.  The brother went out with us to water and identified a few more vegetables.  He also helped get the black chickens in.  He made it look so easy, they just headed home for him.  Stupid chickens!  He also noticed many of the soaker heads in the garden were plugged.  He fixed quite a few and the next day Kevin went around to all the others in the garden and the trees and fixed more. There was always something else that needed to be done. 

Kevin and Manja spent most of the time weeding and cleaning out the huge vegetable garden.  By the end, you could really see the difference.  Between us, we totally filled up one corner of the chicken yard used for yard waste. 

We quickly fell into a routine; Kevin and Manja were early risers, so they did the morning feedings.  We would eat breakfast together then head out to work.  By 11 or 12 it got too hot, so we hung out inside until evening.  Sometimes I went out with my camera to try photograph the many beautiful birds around the farm.  The ever-helpful cat usually tagged along, but it quickly became apparent he had a different idea on what we were doing.  There was one tree next to the house that was filled with tiny birds called fairy wrens.  They are pretty quick and they like to hop around deep in the tree, making it really hard to photograph them.  One evening I was in luck, there were a few of them on the outside branches.  As I was getting them in focus, up jumped the cat, and away flew the birds.  He also liked to help out in the garden, Manja would be weeding away and suddenly the cat would jump out of the bushes, scaring her to death.  I think I mentioned the deadly snakes?

Sometimes we headed to the nearest grocery store.  That was our big outing, going to the grocery store, there was literally nothing else in the town.  One day we decided to go all the way to the city, 30 min away.  For this we took a shower and put on all clean clothes, we wanted to be fancy for the big city lol!  We laughed all day about that, plus the comment that we had to hurry back to get the chickens in! I had one pair of really comfortable work pants, that I rinsed out each day as I took my 3 min shower.  We were in the middle of a drought and were conserving water.  Too bad, I could have stood there under a cold shower for oh so much longer. 

One evening we were all out by the garden and the dad came over with one of his dogs, a wolfhound.  I’m not sure how many he had, there was always a different dog with him.  He took them for a run on his dirt bike in the evenings and stopped by on his way back.  The cat was with us and before we even knew what was happening, the dad jumped off his bike and ran after the dog, who was apparently trying to catch and kill the cat.  I’m not sure how old he is, I think someone said 65 or 70?  He certainly didn’t look like it, and the speed at which he jumped off that bike and took off running, I would say as fast as someone in their 20’s.  I guess hard work every day sure has some benefits. The 3 of us were very impressed!

The family came home early one evening.  We had tacos and burritos waiting and had a fun evening sitting around the big kitchen table chatting.   After dinner, the 5-year-old, decided she wanted me to help her with her puzzles.  Silly girl, I stink at puzzles! As it turns out, she was much better at it then I was, so we basically chatted while she worked away.  The puzzle was Australian animals, which she told me all about.  I decided to show her photographs I had of American animals.  She was surprisingly very interested and attentive.  Next, she decided we should look at unicorns and pegasus. I told her I didn’t have any photos handy, so we Googled them.  She then decided she would draw some for me.  The son soon joined us and drew some pictures too. 

The next day, the kids helped us finish our projects.  The middle daughter helped me push the wheelbarrow, and we had a nice time chatting.  The eldest bounced back and forth between helping me weed the final trees, and Kevin and Manja, who pitched in to finish up the mulching.  It was a super busy day, and of course hot, so when break time came, we were all more than happy to hang out inside.  For dinner, I made a huge Shepard’s pie.  We ate outside in the cool evening air and it was a perfect end to our stay.

Let me just say, although we always stayed inside to avoid the worst of the afternoon heat, inside was hot too, there was no air conditioning.  It seems Australia, like much of Europe, is aircon adverse.  Most of the hotels I’ve stayed in have air, but the houses, like Airbnb don’t.  I feel like America is the only country where NOT having aircon is highly unusual.  I may not like living without, but I have gotten used to it, living in Malta for 2 years.  It sure does make sleeping, especially an afternoon nap, much less pleasant in sweltering heat.  You better believe when I’m in a hotel, the cold air is blasting!

 

The next morning, we were heading out. Kevin and Manja were heading to Sydney, about 6 hours away, and I hitched a ride.  I really enjoyed my time at the farm, made a whole lot more fun with my most excellent companions.  It seemed we never tired of things to talk about or stories to share.  They are such an awesome couple, a real partnership. Whatever chore one was doing, the other was right there helping, be it garden work, cooking, or cleaning up. I love to see young people like them, out to see the world and all it has to offer.  Had the opportunity not arisen for a ride into Sydney, I would have gladly stayed at the farm longer. I enjoyed the family so much and even liked the hard, physical work. 

As I write this, I have just gotten an offer from another farm to come stay with them.  This is farm work, but also working with cattle and repairing fencing.  Can’t wait for another adventure, but first, a 2 week visit to Sydney as a tourist.  In another Airbnb with no aircon….

Link to photos https://photos.app.goo.gl/ZxivkMi38gkMx82CA