About the property

I [Rob] am a retired forester and Landcare worker living in Melbourne. Alison is a retired town planner. In 1991, when I was with Greening Australia, Trust for Nature staff alerted me to a 127-ha block at Stuart Mill between Avoca and St Arnaud. We remain on good terms with the vendors.

The property was severely impacted by fire in 2009, from which it has recovered. We survived in a car in the shed as the house burned down. In 2012, a more fire-resistant house was erected in the domestic area. The property is off-grid with a solar energy system.

To our delight, it was the type locality for a very rare spider orchid. Several other endangered orchids grew there. Since the mid-1990s the department, under its different names, has conducted orchid research here. Eleven hectares of old buloke grow there.

Later, when I worked for Landcare Australia, we bought more land around St Arnaud, particularly for carbon sequestration. We have renovated and greatly enjoy the cottage on our last block at Slaty Creek.

Whilst our Stuart Mill and Tottenham blocks are entirely bushland, the Slaty Creek property, former grazing country, has 50 ha of revegetation established by planting, direct seeding and natural regeneration. We also endeavour to re-create chains of ponds along drainage lines and have started to convert conventional dams into wetlands.