Terrewah is a small farm according to australian standards, 100 acres. More than half is left in its natural forest state. Kirsty and Andrew after a career in hospitality, have decided to change their lives and create their own little paradise.
They bought this land 5 years ago in order to move in with their son and build a solar-passive house in order to preserve coolness or store heat according the season, to which they've added a wood-boiler to warm up some water that goes through the floor to heat it up in case the cold is too much. Solar pannels and several vast rainwater tanks (20 000L each x3 at least) complete their self-sufficiency for the daily life, the garden and the animal needs. The drought this year, unprecedented in Australia for 100 years, has strained the resource and it was necessary to ration the water for everyone. When we came through for our woofing, rain was starting to come back, millimeters by millimeters.
The front of the property was used before for cattle grazing and their plan is thus to restore soil fertility little by little, notably by planting a lot of deciduous trees as with time, slope, bare surface and cattle, the soil is now very poor. It is a long term work.
There a half-acre used for organic gardening using permaculture as well as market-gardener's methods and the objective is to go up to an acre. An orchard was also started. The whole lot needs to be protected by high and deep fences as wombats, though cute and protected in the region, dig big tunnels and destroy the veggies, birds eat the fruits and kangaroos jump into it too.
There are paddocks where the sheeps are regularly moved through and two cows as well as a lot of chiecken which number will be greatly reduced as it takes too much time with everything there is already to do.
The plan is to set-up cottages in order to welcome tourists who could then enjoy good farm products, the farm animals as well as the large forest area behind. Andrew will take care of the hospitality side and Kirsty will continue on with her passion for producing good vegetables.
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