Embarking on a juice fast

"The doctor of the future will no longer treat the human frame with drugs, but rather will cure and prevent disease with nutrition.” Thomas Edison

 

A few weeks ago I watched a documentary film called “Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead”. It follows Joe Cross, an unhealthy Australian man in his 40s as he embarks on a sixty-day vegetable and fruit juice fast in an effort to regain his health. He literally becomes healthy before your eyes and turns his life around.

 

Juice fasting is not a modern fad in western society’s quest to regain health and wellbeing. The history of fasting goes back thousands of years with many religions around the world using fasting as a healing process for spiritual purification and communion with God. Over the centuries doctors have used juice fasting to cure illnesses through resting the body from the high energy needed for food digestion and using the micronutrients in fresh juice to provide energy and support to the body while stimulating the detoxification process.

 

So with this inspiration fresh in my mind, on Saturday 4^th February I began my own little experiment into the world of juice fasting…. actually it’s not completely fasting due to the odd snack of strawberries and my mild avocado addiction.

 

The last time I went on a fast was the forty hour famine when I was sixteen and I suspect it was an excuse not to eat boarding school food for a couple of days more than anything. From memory I was pretty hungry for those two days and didn’t feel particularly well.

 

This time around it’s a whole different story. Despite a number of friends who have juice fasted before me claiming that their energy levels and overall health had improved, I remained dubious. It’s taken me quite some time but thanks to Joe Cross, I’ve finally committed to doing one. Although I felt pretty certain that my stomach would be growling, I’d feel weak with hunger and the whole experience would be less than pleasant, I figured ten days without lamb chops and mashed potato, a pizza, red wine, rum and coke or coffee wouldn’t kill me.

 

Much to my surprise, ten days on (as I type this), I am feeling fantastic. With my twin-gear juicer whirring away on my kitchen bench, I’m drinking as much vegetable and fruit juice as I like and eating one of Barham Avocados delicious Reed avocados a day. I don’t feel hungry, I have more energy, feel clear headed and I’m sleeping well at night; the exact opposite to how I thought I would feel.

 

Experimenting with different juices I have discovered some mouth-watering combinations. Making the most of the summer vegetables and fruits by enjoying watermelon, apple and carrot; beetroot, apple, carrot and lemon; tomato, fresh basil leaves, celery, spinach and cucumber; Kurrnung Citrus oranges, fresh mint, pineapple and watermelon (a taste sensation); carrot, celery, apple, parsley and ginger; cabbage, apple, pear and blueberries.

When I began my juice/avocado fast (read: feast), I initially thought I’d give it a go for ten days. Now I’m thinking I may juice on till towards the end of February, just to see what that’s like. Bearing in mind the Regional World’s Longest Lunch is being held at the Goble’s Walnut Grove on the 2^nd March with four courses, matching wines, tea and coffee (and I fully intend to eat and drink everything in sight), I will make sure my juice fast concludes four or five days beforehand so my stomach can get ready for a day of gastronomic indulgence.

 

Needless to say I’ll be heading over to Koondrook on Sunday morning to see what I can buy at the Farmer’s Market to put through my juicer ….maybe a Pacdon Park pork pie?!

Loving routines

This week it’s back to routine in the House of Barr as term one commenced with our usual Monday morning frenzy. Henry headed out the door alone to the uncharted waters of Year Four at Barham Primary School, Sam and Max struck out together for Barham High School and the untold adventures of Years Seven and Eight. …and not a moment too soon I might add.

I know I said only a couple of weeks ago how much I was loving the lack of routine that school holidays bring but I’m over that now. I want our routine back, it’s comforting and I’ve missed it… that and the six hours from nine till three that I get to work in uninterrupted peace and quiet.

Some routines can be soothing amongst the hustle and bustle of everyday life, well, not our morning routine as that is pure chaos but we have other routines during school term. For instance, Tuesday night is Cheesy Pasta Night. There is no need for the boys or I to wonder what to cook for dinner on Tuesdays, as it is always the same, give or take a few ingredients. The base meal is cream; eggs and Parmesan cheese stirred through a large pot of cooked spiral pasta. When we’re feeling more imaginative we add some steamed broccoli or green beans with mushrooms and bacon sautéed in butter and garlic.

Later in the week (Thursday night to be precise) along comes PAGT night. An acronym that stands for Pancakes, Abba, Gin & Tonic. This little tradition began about six years ago when I discovered an over-supply of limes on my lime tree at Hay. Not wanting to waste them I poured myself a gin and tonic and added generous slices of lime and then thought how nice pancakes would be for dinner with butter, sugar and lime juice… and then I remembered how much I liked listening to the Abba Gold album while drinking gin and tonic and flipping pancakes. Needless to say the night was a huge success all round and we’ve been enjoying PAGT night ever since.

Our favourite routine however, is the nightly bedtime story read by yours truly. Not long after Max was born in 1998 I delved into the world of children’s books and reading aloud to Max, later Sam and later still Henry. 

More than fourteen years on and I’m still reading aloud and getting as much pleasure out of the books as the boys. Along the way we’ve progressed from The Hungry Caterpillar, Where is the Green Sheep and The Cassowary’s Egg to The Roald Dahl Treasury, The Jungle Book and C.S.Lewis’s Narnia series to A Fortunate Life, To Kill a Mockingbird and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to Jonathan Livingston Seagull, Jack Bradford’s Young Samurai series (our favourite – we are eagerly awaiting the publication of book seven in March this year) and our current Harry Potter phase. This week’s bedtime story is book four in the series; Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. We are aiming to read a chapter a night but with 37 chapters and 636 pages it may be the bedtime story for many weeks to come.

Some routines can be stressful and abandoning them for a period of time can be refreshing but other routines are reassuring and having them in our lives gives us a sense of stability and control. Hooray for the start of another school year!

Merimbula, blue bottles and broken legs

Greetings from the coast. This week Team Barr is kicking back in sunny Merimbula on the New South Wales south coast on our annual trip to the beach. This family tradition began in January 2004 thanks to the encouragement of my friends Fleur and Hamish and the generosity of my Mother’s cousin John and his wife Vicky who invited the boys and I to stay at their little 1930s cottage anytime we’d like a beach holiday.

 

Back in 2004 it was a long 675km trek from Hay with 17-month-old Henry, 4 year old Sam and five year old Max. We were on the road by 5am, arrived in Wagga Wagga just before 8am for some Scottish food (breakfast at McDonald’s). Then it was on through Adelong, Tumut and up through the Kosciusko National Park. The awesome power of my trusty Nissan wagon’s 2.8 turbo diesel engine was put to the test in the mountains where it chugged along in second gear.

 

Merimbula on the far south coast of New South Wales is a social spot, with many rural families from the Riverina making their way across the Great Dividing Range each summer. Friends Fleur and Hamish were staying a short ten minute walk from the cottage and late on the afternoon of our first day I ran into Anna, another friend from Hay who was staying by happy coincidence, with her family at a beach house two doors down. She asked after Max and Sam and with a smile inquired how my “youngest and wildest” (Henry) was going? I laughed and said it was only a matter of time before Henry broke an arm or a leg.

 

The next day started beautifully with a picture perfect sunny day. The boys and I went to the Spencer Park Beach and strolled along the sand and paddled in the calm shallow water. I stopped with Henry to make sandcastles and chat with other parents, while Sam and Max continued up the beach looking for shells. Just as I was entering that “living the dream” cloud of happiness and gratitude there was a long piercing scream… Max had discovered and tried to pick up Physalia utriculus otherwise known as the Blue Bottle Jellyfish and suffered multiple stings to his hands. So ended our first beach outing. I bundled Henry, Sam and a still screaming Max back into the wagon and set a new land speed record to the nearest chemist for a large bottle of Soov before making our way back to the cottage for an early lunch and a rest.

 

By mid afternoon Max had recovered and my stress levels had returned to normal. Everyone was feeling well rested and ready to hit the beach once more. While I applied sunscreen to Sam, out of the corner of my eye I caught the flash of movement as 17-month-old Henry launched himself off the top bunk with a pillow in an attempt to fly. For the record, toddlers do not fly, they don’t even glide, they just go splat onto the wooden floorboards below and then emit high-pitched screams. For the second time that day I was bundling a screaming child into the wagon. Anna appeared having heard the commotion, she gave me directions to the Pambula hospital and offered to look after Max and Sam. My flippant comment made less than 24 hours earlier had come true; Henry had broken his right leg.

 

We returned to Anna’s house hours later; Henry in a hip to toe full leg fibreglass cast with waterproof liner and me feeling somewhat less than cheerful. Anna answered the door with a bowl of ice cream for Henry and a glass of wine for me.

 

Battling an almost overwhelming urge to admit defeat and drive home that night, we stuck it out with the support of our friends and the boys and I went on to enjoy our first ever beach holiday. A tradition was born (holidaying at the beach, not breaking legs… I hasten to add).

"Mum, I'm bored"

The summer school holidays for many children, heralds the arrival of long sunny days of relaxation, no homework, more flexible bedtimes and routines in general go out the window. A week away to the coast is usually on our summer agenda but for the rest of the holiday period work continues as normal. The near abandonment of routines during the school holidays does wonders for reducing my daily stress levels.

 

Most mornings during the school term I feel as though I’m the head of a highly disorganised SWAT (Special Weapons And Tactics) team. The mornings are chaotic as the boys and I rush to eat breakfast, make lunches, find school clothes, brush teeth, (occasionally hair), locate school books, sign crumpled school notes containing important bits of information and rummaging around the house for gold coins to send in for various noble causes. This morning routine culminates with my voice booming out, “It’s eight fifteen GO GO GO!!” and Max, Sam and Henry head out the door for their bicycles and school.

 

Hooray for school holidays, for a few weeks the pressure is off. No school lunches to make, no weekly panic to bake muffins or biscuits for play-lunch, no incessant questioning along the lines of, “Have you done your homework?” or demands of, “Come back inside and do your homework….. NOW!”

 

Rather frustratingly for parents the school holidays are also a time where we may hear far too regularly, “Mum/Dad, I’m bored. There’s nothing to do.”

 

One evening only a few weeks into this year’s summer holidays and nine year old Henry came and sat next to me. For a brief moment I thought we were having one of those lovely mother/son bonding experiences… well, up until he started talking that was….

 

Henry: “Mum, what are you doing tomorrow?”

Me: “I’m working tomorrow Henry; what are you doing?”

Henry: “I’m bored tomorrow Mum”

 

Oh great, I thought, now we’ve evolved a step further up the Boredom-o-meter; we are now into the realm of pre-meditated boredom.

 

My remedy is a hefty list of jobs that need attending; it’s amazing how boredom disappears when you suggest perhaps the bored child in question would like to tidy their bedroom/clean the bathroom/mow the lawns/cook dinner ….or maybe they could just go outside and play.

 

My parents circumvented boredom by arranging the annual station program around the holiday dates. General shearing, crutching, lamb-marking etc… were all coordinated to commence at the start of each school holiday. We also had the advantage of the seemingly endless Hay Plains to run around on unsupervised, ride bikes, horses, build cubby houses and forts.

 

Are we just far too over-protective these days? Over zealous and hyped up media reporting of accidents and crimes can cause unnecessary anxiety in parents, making them overly anxious when children are out of eyesight. It can be tempting to hover over our children and make sure they’re okay but this isn’t all that helpful; children need space and time to solve their own problems. Children will struggle with responsibility as adults if they aren’t given opportunities to be responsible as children.

 

Are children today more bored than generations past? Are children losing their imagination and ability to amuse themselves due to an over commitment of extra curricular activities? In our quest to offer our children every opportunity are we denying them the time to develop and use their own imagination and actually think for themselves?

2012: The Year of the Farmer

2012 is the Australian Year of the Farmer. A whole year dedicated to celebrating primary production and bridging the country/city divide. This is good news for those of us living in rural Australia who may feel our city cousins and people living in the larger regional centres take our locally produced food and fibres for granted.

There are approximately 136,000 farms across Australia all working to provide Australians with the high quality of life we enjoy in comparison to many other parts of the world.

Here in Australia we are in the enviable position of being self-sufficient when it comes to feeding our population. As a nation we feed ourselves and we are also able to export 60% of our total agricultural production. Our farmers produce large amounts of high quality food and fibre for the benefit of us all.

Thanks to the sheer size of our country and the different climatic regions we can produce blueberries through to bananas and everything in between. We are able to enjoy a diverse range of food and the opportunity to nourish ourselves with a well balanced diet.

It is wise for Australians to stop and think about agricultural production and where our food comes from. We are the “lucky country” but luck usually involves a fair amount of hard work. Luck is rarely found where complacency dwells and I wonder if we are becoming far too complacent as a nation.

Food security has become a global issue as the world population increases.

Countries such as China with their huge growing populations and decreasing viable farmland are planning ahead for their future by investing in countries outside of their own. Already China has made significant investments in Australian farms, mines and energy production. No doubt the Great Famine that occurred in China between1959 and 1961 where an estimated 20 – 43 million people starved to death is still very much in their memories. Australia on the other hand has never known a famine and it would appear that we are selling our own future for short-term gain. If we sell large tracts of our best agricultural land to other nations such as China, does this mean that potentially in the future we may be reliant on buying food back from China?

Of course all these musings maybe due to my overactive imagination, which this week seems, focussed on doom and gloom. On a brighter note, according to data gathered by the Australian Bureau of Statistics up until 31^st December 2010:

• 99 per cent of Australian agricultural businesses were entirely Australian owned

• 88.6 per cent of agricultural land in Australia was entirely Australian owned

• 91 per cent of the water entitlements for agricultural purposes in Australia were owned by entirely Australian owned businesses.

This is all most reassuring so long as you don’t recall too often the famous quote about statistics, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.

Take the opportunity to celebrate the Year of the Farmer in 2012 by thinking about where your food comes from, talking with farmers, sharing your knowledge with city-based friends (invite them to our monthly farmer’s market in Koondrook) and buying Australian owned and grown produce.

Today is the first day of the rest of your life

Today is the first day of the rest of your life.

 

Every day, each of us has the choice to continue as we’re going, or to do something new that will take us closer to making our dreams come true.

There is nothing like the annual arrival of the New Year to prompt us to reflect on the past and motivate us to dream about our future.

 

With the arrival of the New Year I began my annual list of goals for the next twelve months. It is an easy list to begin because it always includes a few standard goals that I make every year like: Be a Better Parent; Learn a New Skill, Save and Invest Money; Get Fit and Eat Healthy Food (read: lose festive season weight gain); Plan Excellent Adventure to Somewhere New…

Once I have my stock standard goals down then it’s time for the nitty gritty… what do I want to be when I grow up and what do I need to do to achieve this?

 

I think I’ve pondered these two questions since I was about eleven years old and here I am heading into my 42^nd year and I’m still pondering them…. at least I can say with confidence that I am now through the wanting to be an astronaut phase.

 

Along the winding pathway of my life so far, I have experienced lots of different occupations in my quest to discover what I want to be when I grow up: trail riding assistant at a holiday ranch; nanny; jillaroo; student at business college; telesales person (a short-lived career…I lasted one night); waitress in Lygon Street; mail/fax clerk for stockbrokers in Collins Street; contract musterer; tourist officer; mother (an ongoing career); fencing contractor; investor; supervisor for a work-for-the-dole project; Austswim instructor; book-keeper. I love and get a lot of satisfaction out of my current careers: being a mother, remedial massage therapist and columnist for The Bridge.

 

When it comes to achieving goals you are far more likely to succeed if you take the time to actually write your goals down on paper. Not only does this force you to think clearly about what you really want; the simple act of writing your goals down frees up your mind to work on solutions on how you are going to get there.

 

Striving for new goals can also be daunting and often generates fear and anxiety. Stepping out into new territory can be unsettling and will hold most of us back most of the time until either someone gives us a push or we push ourselves. It can be helpful to remember that indecision and procrastination feeds fear. Whenever I feel stuck I remind myself that action cures fear.

 

Happy goal achieving in 2012.

Remembering Christmas

Like a general preparing for some epic battle, I like to have Christmas Day mapped out to military precision… but unlike a general I usually leave it to the last possible moment and then call upon the powers of unbridled panic to get me over the line. Three weeks ago the only Christmas shopping I had completed was ordering a red-gum smoked ham from Barham Meats. Fortunately I have since purchased some gifts for the family, a suitably large frozen turkey and I am now attempting to connect with my inner domestic goddess… and the vacuum cleaner…

 

Christmas Day for me is all about family and food and spending time with people you love. The day can also conjure up feelings of sadness for family members that are no longer here and life paths that haven’t always headed where you thought they would.

 

I have fond childhood memories of Christmas Day. One not so fond memory is the feeling of frustration that used to envelope me on Christmas Eve when I was unable to fall asleep due to excitement-induced insomnia. One year I remember counting sheep out aloud in earnest, I so wanted to be asleep so the morning would come quicker.

 

Christmas was without a doubt the most magical day of the whole year. Tom, Rachel, Bruce and I would all scamper as quietly as we could in the early light of Christmas morning to see what treasures had been left under the tree during the night. Our parents would (finally) appear around 7am and then Father Bill would be in charge of reading the cards on each gift and distributing them to all of us. Following on from the present frenzy we would enjoy a breakfast around the kitchen table of ham, boiled eggs, freshly sliced tomatoes and Mother’s delicious tomato & apple chutney.

 

As a family we either celebrated Christmas at Red Hill Station out on the Hay Plains with ourselves and Gran and the withering heat of summer or every two to three years we made the pilgrimage to my Mother’s family farm in New Zealand where we marvelled at the green grass, white sheep and absence of flies and dust. We would celebrate with Granny Olga and Grandfather and a multitude of aunts, uncles and cousins.

 

Whether the dinner was at Hay or Halcombe we always sat down to a magnificent traditional hot meal prepared with pride by my Mother or if we were across the Tasman, by my Grandmother. Our plates would be piled with roast turkey, gravy, bread sauce, cranberry sauce, roast pumpkin, boiled baby potatoes and steamed green beans. At the conclusion of the main course the curtains would be drawn and the lights switched off as the very impressive Christmas pudding entered the dining room alight, a mass of blue gassy flames fuelled by a half bottle of cheap brandy. By about 4pm on Christmas day most of us were vowing never to eat again and rallying ourselves for a game of backyard cricket.

 

This year is the “away Christmas” with my siblings celebrating at their respective in-law’s homes and the boys and I will be celebrating in Barham with Granny and Grandfather Bill. I am visualising a beautiful 26 degree sunny day so we can dine out on the riverbank… not sure how well my powers of manifestation are going having just had a quick look at the Elders weather site...

 

Wherever you are I hope you’ve enjoyed reading Behind the Barr in 2011 and wish you all a very happy and joy-filled Christmas and an excellent year ahead in 2012.

The joys of owning a dog

During a moment of uncharacteristic weakness in October I relented and agreed that Max could get a puppy. I was caught up in the nostalgia of my own country childhood and growing up with our farm dogs. My first dog was Blackie, a big shaggy black sheep dog who arrived before I was born and was famous for swimming the Murrumbidgee River in full flood to visit a bitch over fifty kilometres away. Blackie’s working mate was my older brother’s dog Rinso a shorthaired black and white collie. I can still remember the feeling of awe that came over me in my Grandmother’s laundry the day I discovered that a washing powder had been named after Tom’s dog.

Another good sheepdog from my childhood was Abba, a black and tan kelpie who arrived as a pup in 1974; the same year a Swedish band won the Eurovision Song Contest. Dad reckoned the pup sounded as though he was trying to sing “Waterloo” when he howled at night.

A good working dog is worth its weight in gold and my all time favourite to this day was a black and tan kelpie bitch I was given in 1991. Spook as I named her, was a beautiful looking kelpie, the Elle Macpherson of the dog world. Unfortunately she was also extremely timid and unable to run having spent the first part of her life locked in a cage and not handled. Several times during the first month of my ownership Dad advised me not to become too attached as “she probably won’t make a sheepdog and you’ll have to shoot her.” Fortunately for Spook we persevered and I took her everywhere with me. She quickly learnt to stick on the back of a motorbike or ute and keep out of the way of horses hooves. A month’s holiday at my parent’s property got her socialising with other dogs and she learnt how to run.

For about the first twelve months Spook was my constant companion but did no work whatsoever. She watched the mustering of sheep with interest from the back of the bike but showed no inclination to actually get off and assist until one day when she was about eighteen months old. I was putting a large mob of merino ewes through a narrow gate and the leaders were getting away. As I started to get agitated and curse Spook looked at me sympathetically. Gesticulating wildly towards the sheep I said to her “Don’t just watch, get off the bloody bike and do something!” …and with that she took off through the fence and around the mob in a perfect cast. She held the leading sheep neatly until the tail of the mob was through the gate and together we got them to their destination. (I still get a warm fuzzy feeling inside when I remember that day) From that day onwards she rarely put a foot wrong and her ability to work out what needed to be done when it came to sheep work was uncanny.

With those fond memories in my mind, on the evening of November 2^nd 2011 (it was a Wednesday night around 7 o’clock), Jackie the black and tan kelpie joined our family.

As I lay in bed that night listening to her incessant howling (sorry neighbours), I had two main thoughts: “Thank goodness I’m leaving for Western Australia tomorrow” and “I hope she’s all grown up and through the puppy stage by the time I get back”…ok, well the second thought was optimistic and totally unrealistic I know.

Moulamein Races - bush racing at its best

The festive season kicks along tomorrow with the annual Moulamein Races set to swell the northern end of our shire by a couple of thousand people. There’s nothing quite like a country race meeting to entice people out for a day of socialising, glamorous attire and gambling.

My excitement levels have been slightly subdued on discovery that my planned race outfit has uncharacteristically shrunk in my wardrobe during the last month or so. It would appear that November’s excellent adventure to Western Australia combining detailed research into beer and pizza with Margaret River wines and cheeses is to blame… I may end up wearing a toga in the hotly contested Fashions on the Field and stand next to the über glamorous Emma (First Lady of Wakool Shire) in a thinly veiled attempt to bask in her fashion aura. No matter what I wear, I have no doubt I will be enjoying catching up with friends and having fun in my attempts to back a winning horse. Using age old techniques such as “What colour is the jockey wearing?” “What number is the horse?” and “What is the horse’s name and can I draw any significance to that name?” I am ever optimistic of winning some lunch money.

Horseracing has been interwoven into the social fabric of Australia since the first Melbourne Cup was run in 1861. Mark Twain, the great American writer, humorist and author of “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn”, visited Australia and went to the Melbourne Cup in 1895, observing:

“Nowhere in the world have I encountered a festival of people that has such a magnificent appeal to the whole nation. The Cup astonishes me.”

More than one hundred years since Mr Twain visited our shores and the Cup still stops and unites the nation. Whether that is to attend the race in person; watch it on television; listen to it on a wireless out in the paddock or in my case this year: enjoying the extraordinarily delicious buffet lunch in the Barham Hotel’s beer garden with some friends before downing my glass of sparkling mineral water and heading back to work.

My father Farmer Bill is a keen racegoer and enjoys making a few pilgrimages each year to Flemington to watch the “Sport of Kings” and try his luck on the horses. He has made the observation on more than one occasion that people at race meetings are all smiling and having a good time and often losing money, while people playing poker machines in casinos are devoid of smiles, tense, glum and also often losing money. You can now bet on computer generated racehorses on the internet and often lose money alone in the comfort of your home… I suspect this form of gambling does little to enhance a community’s spirit or an individual’s self-worth.

Meanwhile back to Moulamein Races that will be celebrating more than 130 odd years of bush racing tomorrow. Where the sun will be shining (most likely literally or if not, metaphorically), community spirit will be alive and well and fun times will be had by all… long may they last.

National parks and state forests need common sense management

With the official arrival of summer yesterday and already at least one “horror” day a couple of months ago of 30 plus degrees with a howling northerly wind, my thoughts turned somewhat apprehensively towards the magnificent red gum forests that surround our towns of Barham and Koondrook. Bushfires are an inevitable part of life in Australia and yet how this threat is managed often leaves plenty to be desired (just ask the poor inhabitants of the Margaret River region of Western Australia who lost their homes last week courtesy of an out-of-control control burn).
 

In the last twelve months large areas of our local bush have been locked up under the banner of state forests and national parks. A move that put a smile on the faces of the enthusiastic environmental extremists of our nation while decimating our local economy that was previously reliant on the sustainable logging of the red gum forests. In past years when the inevitable lightning strike sparked a bushfire it was often our local timber workers in conjunction with the Rural Fire Service who answered the call to help with their equipment. Logging tracks were maintained, providing access and suitable equipment such as graders, excavators etc were on hand to help contain and extinguish the fires. Who will be on hand now, what equipment will be available and will the bush tracks be maintained to an accessible standard?
 

On the 19^th February 2009 a group of fellow massage therapists and I drove into the charred remains of Marysville, Victoria. As part of a team for the Australian Practitioner Emergency Response Network (APERN) we were called in to massage exhausted CFA workers, army personnel and the forensic police. Seeing the still smouldering aftermath of Black Saturday first hand was a sobering experience to put it mildly. Since then much time and public money has been spent by state and federal governments on trying to work out who is to blame for the Black Saturday fires and how to prevent a reoccurrence of that situation. Personally I am a bit of a fan of the “Keep It Short and Simple” or KISS principle and while I’m not suggesting logging and or cattle grazing would have prevented those fires, I am pretty sure it would have reduced their intensity.
 

While urban greenies and environmental scientists are busy explaining to us country folk how detrimental selective logging and cattle grazing is to our eucalypt forests these same forests are being wiped out by bushfires, along with anything else in the path of the fires. Perhaps my view is overly simplistic, but I cannot understand why well managed seasonal cattle grazing to reduce the fuel load in the forests and selective logging isn’t a better option? The red gums in our district are springing up like a crop of un-thinned mutant carrots thanks to the flooding of the last two years. How long before we have our own Black Saturday event and will the greenies come and save us?