Orders for books, cards and photographs are processed immediately upon my return, then email and phone messages are responded to. When I am away phone messages will be checked once a week or so when possible – however only urgent calls can be responded to prior to returning home.  (I work long hours when away and in any case am often a big distance from the nearest phone connection or mains power supply.)

The office will be closed at these times:

• September – approx Mon 13th to Mon 27th, approx – this trip is weather dependent, so dates may alter (again!).
• November – Sunday 14th to Thursday 25th, approx.
• Perhaps one other trip away to take photographs, in October (dates T.B.A.)

Please note, orders are processed strictly in the order they are received in, except that online orders have priority over phone, mail and fax orders (because less administration is involved). If you intend purchasing as a gift for an upcoming event please note the above dates when I will be away and don’t forget to order in plenty of time.

In the meantime if you stumble upon any errors that have been missed, it would be much appreciated if you could throw a rock my way so I can fix the mistake.

Where to send these desperate enquirers for advice?  They come from all over Australia and even other countries (U.S.A, Canada and England, for example).  Of course rural businesses are just like any other small business – most owners/managers are flat out carving out a living in what is not an easy business, and they simply don’t have the necessary time or resources to employ kids who are more likely to need extra assistance and supervision, and more likely to have an attitude problem.  And ultimately, if the teenager is not self-motivated to a reasonable degree, then it doesn’t matter how motivated the concerned parent is – all the help in the world is more likely to be of no use.   That said – very often it is the kids with an over abundance of energy, who like doing rather than sitting around listening, that have a disastrous time at school but take to rural employment like ducks to water.

There are some programmes to assist indigenous kids start a career in the rural industry  but as far as I know, there’s no programmes to help the non-indigenous.

‘Outback 8′ was originally screened on Channel 10 and it is being re-run on ABC 3 (kids channel) at present – weeknights at 6.30pm.  As I’m working then I haven’t seen every episode but what I have is impressive (especially since I very rarely watch ’reality’ shows).  I wish there were intensive, short-term training programmes like what is shown on Outback 8 running all year round in every state (and territory) in Australia.  It’s an ideal way for kids to test out a career handling livestock.  Four of the kids in ‘Outback 8′ were from the U.K. and the other four from various parts of Australia – and all are from diverse backgrounds and with diverse interests – from boxing to violin playing and surfing.  They are aged from 12 to 14.   Sulky attitudes and can’t-do beliefs are slowly overcome by impressively patient and skilled instructors – Ingrid O’Neill (a horsewoman from a property near Richmond, north Qld) and Dave Manchon (from the Gold Coast – a journalist, surfer and horseman with the lead role in the Australian Outback Spectacular).   The four weeks of training filmed in ‘Outback 8′ took place at the Longreach Pastoral College.  These young teenagers learned to ride and look after horses, and muster sheep and cattle and work them in the yards.  Above all they learned to work as a team, get along with others, and to never give up.

If only there was a training programme like this to recommend to worried parents!  It wouldn’t be cheap to run, but infinitely cheaper for taxpayers than picking up the pieces later, when kids have run amok after years of not fitting in at school.

This television programme has no doubt inspired a swag of young teenagers to head bush as soon as they are old enough.  Decades ago many of the older generation commenced work on cattle stations when they were 14 (usually because school didn’t agree with them, or due to family circumstances – formal education was a luxury they couldn’t afford), however these days most rural employers don’t employ school leavers until they are at least 16 (for work place health & safety reasons, etc).  Quite a few places are prepared to take keen students on for a few weeks of work experience, and pastoral companies employ large numbers of unskilled staff at the commencement of every dry season (usually before Easter).  And of course there are quite a few agricultural colleges spread across regional areas of Australia.  Most specialise in specific avenues of agriculture which relate to the primary production activity taking place in the particular region.  For example, Burdekin Ag. College has concentrated on farming (in particular cane farming and tropical horticulture) whereas Longreach Pastoral College has been known for concentrating on horsemanship, sheep and cattle handling.

The single best achievement these rural independents could make would be raising the Remote Area Zone Tax Rebate/Zone Tax Offset up from the rates which don’t appear to have changed much since the original introduction in 1945. 

Encouraging population decentralisation in this most economically efficient manner (a tax rebate is infinitely better than upfront subsidies) would have a multitude of benefits.  Eg helping the environment by limiting the over-use pressure on open spaces (rivers, beaches, parks, bushland etc) in and around our largest cities.  And pegging back the brick & tile sprawl into bushland would help preserve native plants and animals in what are often our most biodiverse regions, as well as protecting increasingly scarce (and increasingly valuable) food producing land (thus reducing pollution caused by excessive haulage and maintaining use of our most efficient food growing land – i.e. reducing the need for inputs such as fertiliser and irrigation). 

A Remote Area Zone Tax Rebate at a level that genuinely reflects the much higher cost of living, working and raising a family in the bush would assist small remote regional business owners directly and indirectly via their employees.  And it would restore at least some social equality and dignity to the most remote regional residents upon whose food growing and export-income efforts the rest of us are entirely dependent.  Prosperous regional economies help ensure prosperous cities.  Apart from a tiny number of locally residing miners, the majority of rural residents have much lower incomes than coastal residents, poorer health statistics and much higher living expenses.  A healthy tax rebate for genuinely permanent remote residency would also encourage the cessation of the extremely socially destructive fly-in fly-out mining practices.  

A simple example of the higher cost of living in remote areas is petrol.  In the remotest parts of Australia – where there is of course no government (i.e. taxpayer) subsidised public transport - unleaded petrol is now around $2.00 per litre.   This is about $1.82 plus 18c GST per litre.  Compare this to today’s list of cheap petrol prices in Melbourne, which averages $1.13 per litre.  This is $1.03 plus 10% GST of just 10c per litre.  Given that the resident paying an extra 8c GST per litre is likely to have to drive a round trip of 700km or more to get to their closest bank, post office, food retailer or doctor, and the resident with easy access to cheaper fuel is likely to only have to do a max. of 10km or less to get to and from these essential services (and with the option of cheap, subsidised public transport as well), it’s very obvious that the person living in a remote area is coughing up a massive amount more in Goods and Services Tax than someone living in a city.  Higher prices for goods in remote areas are inevitable due to freight costs, the lack of economies of scale/bulk buying purchase discounts for smaller turnover retailers, and the higher living costs also borne by the remote area business owners.

I’ve actually been asked ‘why should people in cities subsidise people living in the bush?’.  When I have recovered from the shock of such a display of ignorance, I’ve explained that what they perceive as ‘subsidisation’ is in reality ‘equitable taxation’ and set about providing a rough & ready but nonetheless effective summary of the history of ‘civilisation’:

- in cave man times, it was every man (and woman) for themselves.  Their daily lives were spent gathering and catching enough food to eat for that day.  In most parts of Australia, this is how aboriginal people lived prior to the arrival of Europeans.  In better seasons and in better areas there was some lie-around-and-relax time, but much of the time – there was minimal time for relaxation.  Bush tucker gathering is constant yakka, in most areas natural food supplies are insufficient to allow for all-year-round permanent settlement, and it’s perilous.  People living a subsistence life are constantly at risk of starvation due to a poor season (too much or too little rain or temperatures that are too hot or cold), a locust plague or a bushfire.

- In countries where plant species were well suited to being grown as monocultures and soil and climate made it do-able, some people started farming and producing more food than they could eat themselves.  They started trading their excess with people who weren’t so keen on food producing, who started up businesses producing something else instead (eg clothing or furniture) or providing a services (eg mud hut building).  The two major aspects of modern society were born - trading & towns.

- As food production, transport and storage systems (eg refrigeration) advanced and became more sophisticated, more and more people were able to spend their lives working in occupations other than food production.  Tiny villages turned into towns and then into cities and some of these turned into huge metropolises, with housing, goods and services arranged in a certain manner according to frequency of use/public demand etc.  (This is basic urban planning principles recalled from year 11 geography, thanks Mrs de Vries.)

- But one thing hasn’t changed.  Everyone needs food.  No farmers = no cities.  Most urban residents don’t have nearly enough land to produce enough food for themselves to eat all year round – even if they did have the necessary knowledge and enthusiasm to do so.

- We’re on an island.  Yes it’s a big one, but it’s still an island.  Ask a Briton who lived through the food shortages of WWII what they think of relinquishing all local food production in favour of 100% imports.  Ask the average Aussie if they’re prefer to eat food grown & handled under our own food production standards, or that of a third world country where survival is at a premium and food safety standards are secondary. 

- Australia no longer rides on the sheep’s back but agriculture does still account for a large amount of export income.  This purchases everything from TVs to dishwashers, affordable clothes and cars.  All produced in other countries.  No export income = no imports.

- It’s more efficient to have the Australia population spread around in regions rather than concentrated in just a handful of massive cities.  It seems to me Australian cities reach peak economies of scale with regard to provision of services (eg specialist medical services, base hospitals and universities, which need a large population to be justifiable and sustainable) and social/living standard levels somewhere around 150,000 people (depending on the catchment area, etc).   Larger than that, and the problems associated with big cities start to proliferate (pollution, urban sprawl, traffic problems, crime, vandalism and other anti-social behaviour associated with perceived anonymity etc).   For smaller towns, around 10-15,000 is a good number – big enough to support at least a couple of big supermarkets, a range of banks, car dealers and mechanics, doctors, a hospital and other government services.

- Decentralisation also helps maintain a much more diverse and interesting national identity, and reducing the number of large areas with no permanent residents gives us a more flexible security blanket should climatic changes (short or long term) make residing in any particular area more difficult.  And a well populated north helps keep Australia free of smugglers (from native animals and birds, to drugs and illegal immigrants) – thus helping to keep out serious foreign pests and diseases that would decimate our native animals and plants; domestic animals and our economy.

 - And there is of course the issue of social justice.  Apart from a relatively small amount of tax refunded to tax payers in remote areas, they pay income tax at the same rate as anyone else.  And because goods and services are much more costly, they actually pay a lot more GST to obtain the same amount of goods and services, compared to residents in capital cities (where it’s also very easy to save large amounts of money by consistently shopping for convenient bargains).  Yet remote area residents do not have ready access to all the government provided services paid for by their taxes and so taken for granted in cities – from public transport to libraries, galleries, festivals, local schools and hospitals, good quality all-weather roads, local ABC radio and television news services, etc.  In fact there’s a large slab of inland Australia that can’t even receive any ABC radio services, except on their TV or computer (of no use when you’re not in your office or loungeroom, and worse than useless when you’re spending a few hours in the car on the way to the nearest town).

These days the most socially disadvantaged aren’t living in cities, they’re in the bush, producing our food and export income.  Raising the Remote Area Zone Tax Rebate to a level equivalent with the rate paid when it was first introduced in 1945, would also send a message to remote Australians to let them know they were respected and valued. 

Of course with fly-in fly-out miners being ineligible for any remote area tax rebate/zone tax offset, because fly-in fly-out shiftworkers are not genuinely permanent rural residents only visitors; they purchase little or no goods and services locally, have very good travel and living conditions provided for by their employers, and their home base is almost always a home of a quality way above the average residence in large cities on or near the coast.  In other words, they have absolutely none of the financial disadvantages faced by genuine remote area residents (and are in fact better off financially than the average city resident).  At present miners only have to spend 182 days over 2 years in a remote area to be eligible for the Zone Tax Offset – clearly a ridiculous situation.

The October 2008 A.R. Fullarton submission to the Australia’s Future Tax System Review is an excellent summary of the issues concerning the Remote Area Zone Tax Rebate system.  For example the writer quite rightly points out that residents of large cities such as Darwin and Townsville should no longer be eligible for any Remote Area Zone Tax Rebate, nor should fly-in fly-out miners; and that these savings (from a lot of people claiming small amounts) could be spent on raising the taxation rebate for genuine remote residents (a much higher amount going to a small number of people).  This Tax Review submission can be accessed on this page.

In God is our trust – The Farmers Arms

‘Let the Wealthy & Great,

Roll  in Splendor & State,

I envy them not I declare it.

I eat my own Lamb,

My chickens and Ham,

I shear my own Fleece & I wear it

I have Lawns, I have Bow’rs,

I have Fruits, I have Flow’rs,

The Lark is my morning alarmer.

So jolly boys now, Here’s God speed the Plough.

Long Life & Succefs to

the Farmer.’

There’s quite a bit of sale information on the internet regarding various English china and pottery produced with the ‘Farmers Arms’ poem.   The abovementioned oversized cup and saucer is transfer ware produced by the Adams family pottery in Staffordshire, England (dating back to the 17th century; no longer in existence, but some designs still manufactured by Wedgewood).   Apparently the Adams pottery also produced other crockery with similar designs.

Burgess & Leigh (B & L Ltd; Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent) also produced pottery with the ‘Farmers Arms’ poem on it around a century ago – cups and saucers and plates, and a large punchbowl with a set of mugs to match.  They apparently also produced a mug with the following verse:

“We plough the fertile meadow

And sow the furrow’d land.

But yet the waving harvest

Depends on God’s on hand

It is his mercy gives us

The sunshine and the rain

That paints in verdant beauty

The mountain and the plain.”

There are also ironstone mugs produced by Burleigh Pottery (also of Staffordshire, England; operating since 1851 and best known for producing blue and white china, eg with the well known ’calico chintz’ pattern) titled ‘God Speed the Plough’ and  ’Industry Produceth Wealth’ with the same ‘Farmers Arms’ poem.

Wade Potteries (Staffordshire – again) produced a limited edition run of 500 two-handled cider mugs with the ‘Farmers Arms’ verse on them, in 1981, for the Taunton Cider Company.

After heavy rain in early 2009 heavy metals leaked from Ernest Henry gold & copper mine water storages into two watercourses that run through Fort Constantine Station.  The minerals include arsenic, lead, copper, cobalt and chloride.

The state government Department of Environment & Resource Management (DERM) is also pursuing Ernest Henry Mining over the same spill, and four other mining companies for environmental damage elsewhere.  These are:  Australia Raw Materials Corporation Pty Ltd (Great Australia Mine), the Lady Annie Mine (parent company CopperCo Ltd), MMG Century Ltd (Century Mine) and Birla Mt Gordon Pty Ltd.

Pastoralists all over Australia will be watching the Stanbroke Vs Ernest Henry Mine case with a great deal of interest.  There is a perception in the bush that while pastoralists are not even allowed to cut down a tree or two for any purpose including fencing, mining companies can pretty well behave as they please, with impunity.  Flying over thousands of square miles of shot lines crossing fragile creeks and gullies is perhaps the best illustration.  Mining activity has caused damage of varying degrees and types to pastoral land all over Australia.  Damage ranges from groundwater contamination and water table lowering (including the Great Artesian Basin), surface water use and pollution, air pollution from smelter discharges, and the degradation/pollution of food-producing land and the natural environment (soil and creeks/rivers).  Stanbroke are to be commended for pursuing this case, as action like this will help throw the spotlight on issues gnawing away at many landholders, and help ensure mining companies take more care in future.

To explain away leaking tailings dam pollution by saying that the rainfall was ‘unprecedented’ and ‘unexpected’ etc is absolutely pathetic.  We all know how erratic Australian rainfall is and that it is not uncommon for most parts of Australia to receive their whole annual rainfall within just a few days – from Melbourne to Cairns to Broome and all points inbetween.  Our oldest rainfall records only date back slightly more than a couple of centuries so it’s simply unacceptable to claim that because one rainfall event broke a record that is only 200 years old (or even less than 130 years old, in the case of most of northern Australia), they should be excused from environmental care and responsibility.  Weather patterns consist of small and large cycles – from daily cycles right up to long term cycles over thousands of years.  A century or two of records is a mere fly spot on the earth’s calendar.

Miners, of all people, are completely aware of the age of the earth and climatic variability because the minerals they’re digging up are millions of years old (an estimaged 1500 million years ago, in the case of Ernest Henry), laid down when the region’s climate was very different.  For mining companies to claim that heavy rainfall was a surprise when they’re digging up something created when the area was a rainforest or under the sea, is simply laughable.  There isn’t any other group in society that is faced with such a degree of daily first hand evidence of the changing environment as much as miners.

Go Stanbroke, it won’t just be the Cloncurry and Gulf Pastoralists cheering for you, it will be every property owner who has ever been affected by mining activity.  Plus everyone who has wondered why, when it comes to looking after the earth and water supplies, there is one rule for some and one rule for others.

For a contrast that summarises the contrast between sustainable & environmentally friendly agriculture and pillaging & polluting mining, check out the information and images on this page on the Ernest Henry Mining Pty Ltd website and this page of the Stanbroke website.  I cannot for the life of me understand why we have a growing pro-vegetarian movement based on ‘being more environmentally responsible’ when mining companies are treating the environment however they like and virtually no-one is taking any notice at all.   I’m still astonished that Santos is allowed to drill for oil and gas right down in actual bed of the Cooper Creek Channels!  If this sort of environmental-disaster-waiting-to-happen was being created in Parramatta, Ipswich or Broadmeadows there would be an uproar.   It’s probably only a matter of time before ‘record breaking floods’ cause a catastrophic oil leak into one of Australia’s most pristine river systems.  Just more evidence that the pro-vegetarian movement is actually being driven by one-eyed animal liberationists with an entirely different (hidden) agenda rather than genuine environmentalists.  If they were serious about the health of our environment, they’d be listing mining activity right up the top of their priorities.  We need minerals but we need food and a healthy natural environment even more.  If only the pro-vegetarian fanatics would redirect their considerable energies to ensuring mining was carried out in a more environmentally responsible fashion.

Given that Texas is the U.S. state most often quoted as being the most similar American state to northern inland Australia, any Aussie wanting to study agriculture (in particular the cattle industry) in the U.S. would be well placed to have a good look at Texas A & M. 

This has increased Paraway Pastoral Company’s livestock capacity to 200,000 sheep and 200,000 cattle. 

The Federal Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (DAFF)  website hosts the Australian Plague Locust Commission (APLC) website.  APLC has information on locust and grasshopper identification, with excellent photos accompanying the list of species in a couple of stages, plus species distribution maps.  There is also control and research information plus current and predicted locust activity news bulletins.  This is because locusts build up after a good season/s and move into farming areas and decimate crops – in central northern Queensland they are known to decimate anything coloured green, including garden hoses.  These locusts can travel very long distances.  The website also has online forms to email reports of locust activity to the Australian Plague Locust Commission.

The APLC was set up in 1976 to monitor and help control Australian Plague Locusts, due to the difficulty in co-ordinating the relevant state government departments.  In 1986 the APLC also undertook the management of Spur Throated Locusts and Migratory Locusts, in certain areas. 

The Australian Plague Locust Commission is funded by the Commonwealth Government and 4 member states – NSW, Victoria, South Australia and Queensland (in order of financial contributions).

• The largest cattle stations are located in the remotest parts of Australia and specific, reliable information and images remain scarce.  This is unlike sheep properties, most of which are located in more closely settled areas – in relative terms, not far from larger towns and capital cities.  Because of this relative proximity to rural  journalists and photographers  (which means sheep places are relatively visible and more quickly & cheaply accessed) life on Australian sheep properties has been much more thoroughly documented than life on Australia’s largest cattle stations.  In addition, a lot of  this wool industry coverage has been much better quality, because a lot more of it has been from photographers and writers who have a genuine understanding of their subject (they are not just outsiders looking in, as has too often been the case regarding northern cattle stations).   Any inaccurate coverage is usually corrected by those who pick the error up.  Whereas a capital city paper can run a story on a remote cattle station which is very inaccurate and a) only a very tiny percentage of readers [if any] will know there are errors, as there inevitably is  and b) an even tinier percentage of those are likely to go to the trouble of writing to the paper or journalist concerned, telling them to get their act together.
• Relatively few sheep properties muster stock with horses – mostly it’s motorbikes and utes, and/or dogs; except in very hilly or rough country.  And photographing horses – especially the quantities involved in genuine work - has been a major drawcard for me.  Few people are aware of the dependence of large Australian cattle stations on stockhorses for mustering and walking stock.  Unfortunately many people are under the illusion that motorbikes, helicopters and planes have taken over cattle station mustering, which is only the case in certain regions (mostly flat, relatively open country – not  northern Australia).

The Australian merino wool industry certainly has a fascinating culture and history, and unfortunately wool producers have been through some very tough times during recent decades.  Sadly, sheep have now disappeared from many areas where world-famous Merino wool has been grown for many decades.  For example, sheep have disappeared from most downs country properties between Townsville and Mount Isa and greatly reduced in numbers further south.  They have been replaced by cattle – easier to manage (requiring fewer and less skilled staff) and relatively profitable by comparison – at least in recent years.    Sheep have even disappeared from many famous Merino Studs, bought up by Australian and overseas companies chasing easier short term profits provided by cattle and crop growing.

Given the increase in environmental sustainability awareness, it is very surprising that wool has not become highly fashionable again in recent years.  Hopefully it will.  After all, what is more environmentally friendly than shearing a sheep, returning it to the paddock to eat grass and drink water – whereupon it produces a lamb and another fleece which you shear off twelve months later to turn into warm jumpers and socks?