From Strength to Strength

by Sara Henderson

  Most of the speaking requests were for eight to twelve months in the future, and they came in so thick and fast I had to put a hold on them. As I explained to the people who rang, my daughter and I were still working about eighty hours per week keeping the station operating and if I had accepted even one third of the requests, I would have been travelling full-time.

  I then received another request. Again I began to explain that I could not afford the time when the voice on the other end interrupted.

  ‘Oh, you are paid.’

  This was news to me. Still I said, ‘I really don’t think so. I get so nervous, I don’t think I could.’

  ‘They want you to speak in Hawaii, first class travel, five-star accommodation. You can go for the whole week of the convention at their expense.’

  All that made me stop and think. Then they mentioned the fee and that floored me.

  ‘You can’t be serious. They’ll pay me all that money on top of airfares and accommodation?’ Nerves or not, I couldn’t refuse so much money for a half-hour speech. We worked thirty hours to achieve the same results. So, with my eyes on the money, I accepted. It was four months away, I could get nervous later.

  CHAPTER 27

  1990-1991

  Later in November, my Rottweiler puppy arrived. She was gorgeous. We called her Jedda. I can’t help but wonder at all the bad press these fine animals have been receiving lately. I don’t care what any expert says, it is all in the training.

  I suppose many people would say we are eccentric when it comes to our animals—we speak to them as we do people. But there are very few who have not commented on how wonderful our animals are—our dogs, our cat, our stallion who stands in the middle of the living room under the fan, our milking cows who go to the bedroom window of the person who is milking them to moo if the person is behind schedule.

  Recently an English boy was here who was so scared of Hunter, our male Rottweiler, he would not even come into the homestead garden. When we found this out Marlee decided to introduce them properly. The boy was very ill at ease but he agreed.

  ‘Hunter, this is Dave and he’s very afraid of Rottweilers, so you be very nice to him and show him how lovely you are. Say hello.’

  Hunter quietly walked up to Dave and put his massive head on Dave’s lap and looked into his eyes. It was love at first sight and from then on, whenever Dave was near the house, he would be found playing with Hunter.

  The training of people does not differ greatly. Anyone who throws an empty can on the ground at Bullo is fined fifty dollars for littering. It does not take long to train each new group. Their names are written on the bottom of their cans for the first few weeks, and usually this is enough. And like an old sheep dog training a young pup, the current group of stockmen will always train the next group.

  ‘Don’t drop your cans on the ground—fifty dollar fine.’

  Marlee said one morning they were all driving out to a new section of fence they were building when Dave shouted, ‘Stop! I left a Coke can standing on one of the posts in the yard!’ Marlee assured him it was safe until lunchtime and if I found it, she would give evidence on his behalf. Despite this reassurance from Marlee, she said he was fidgety all morning and only returned to normal when he got his hands on the empty Coke can again.

  We had friends and employees for Christmas, so it was a busy, cheerful time. The phone stopped ringing every five minutes and we had lovely rain. Magically, as it does every year, the vast golden brown valley turned lush green and the cattle waded through feed knee high and ate until they were rolling fat.

  The wet of 1990–91 was our first normal rainfall since Cyclone Tracy. Our rainfall until 1974 had been thirty to thirty-five inches, but after 1974 it dropped back to between twenty and twenty-five inches. However, at least we had rain.

  People say to us how brave we are, fighting the wilderness, braving the isolation of the Outback. But these are easy opponents, compared with drought. To watch your land shrivel and die, year in and year out, to see beautiful fields turn to dust bowls, to watch your animals starve and die. To suffer all this, only to be then washed away in a flood, your home and your family treasures lost and destroyed. And to then pick up the pieces and start again. The farmers of the South are the brave!

  Compared with these people, we live in luxury, a harsh and demanding luxury, but with rain every year, no devastating floods, control of fire by our natural boundaries, and plenty of ground water, it is a sort of luxury. Living in isolation and carving something out of the wilderness is only development.

  Part of our development this last wet was to grow our own hay. As each year passes and the control of our herd improves, we need more and more hay. So given the increased tonnage required, the cost of transport and the increasing cost of quality hay, we decided to grow our own. Of course, it was not that easy.

  We knew nothing about farming, so we had to learn from the ground up, so to speak. We had tractors, but we needed a plough. Jim to the rescue again. He lent us a plough and seeder, and also told us what to do.

  I think everyone gets a thrill out of growing something. To see tilled rich brown earth all neatly ploughed and, after a shower of rain, row upon row of little green shoots is very satisfying.

  Until 1960 Bullo was an isolated valley, a part of Auvergne Station. It was a little pocket to one side of a five-million-acre property. When Charles bought it in 1962, the land was in its natural state. It had a gravel airstrip and a donkey track over the mountain rather optimistically referred to as an ‘access road’. And that was the full extent of its development. So the first tilling for our small one-hundred-acre farming project was quite a momentous occasion, as it was the first time the soil had been turned by a plough.

  As well as growing sorghum to feed our animals, we were attacking our weed problem. Weeds come with development. In the early days, we did not have weeds, but when our road improved and cattle trucks came into the valley, the weed problem came too. The seeds drop off the trucks along the sides of the road and with a fifty-mile access road, it was not long before we had weeds. This problem was further aggravated by heavy stocking in paddocks for the testing of cattle during our BTEC programme.

  Since starting the programme back in 1983, we have increased our fencing to such an extent that we can now rest paddocks and attack the weed problem. We started with one hundred acres of thick cida weed. We ploughed the cida, turning the roots over to the sun, and left it for about ten days. We then ploughed it all again. The skies were getting blacker by the day and we managed to plant and fertilise just in time for a lovely shower of rain. Of course it entailed much more than these few lines indicate. We had Jim constantly on the line, and on weekends we had lessons ‘in the field’.

  We had to plant where the crop was protected from the cattle until it was hay. Because of early rain, paddocks in low areas that we had set aside to plough became too wet. There was not enough time for further fence-building, so we utilised the airstrip. The airstrip is nicely fenced and stock-proof. We left a narrow strip down the middle for the planes to land, and the rest was ploughed.

  Of course one thing we had not thought of was that eventually the sorghum reaches a height of twelve feet. It closed the homestead in and, looking across to the mountains, we couldn’t see the cattle grazing in the paddocks. Watching the planes land was very amusing. They would approach the airstrip and then disappear into a field of sorghum.

  I went out to meet a plane one day and the pilot was quite relieved to see me appear.

  ‘I was getting worried. It’s a bit like a maze. I thought I could be searching for hours, looking for the homestead.’

  Then there was the mowing and baling. I thought that growing the stuff was the hard part, but little did I realise . . . On the airstrip we had the additional problem of having to move the machines into a corner every time a plane wanted to land. The ‘machines’ consisted of a mower conditioner and a baler. Both machines were second-hand as new was not within our budge
t.

  The mower conditioner was almost new and it was a gem. It never missed a beat, did everything the operator’s manual said it would, and under instructions from Jim, we cut the crop at the right time and were ready for baling.

  The baler was another matter. I knew absolutely nothing about baling machines, but when it was started I knew we were in trouble. I have never seen so many moving parts on one machine in all my life. There were spikes and belts and flaps all moving at once in different directions. We had no end of problems and, unfortunately, Jim was not up on balers. But over the next few months, like us, he became an expert.

  David, who drove this ghastly machine, had the patience of Job, although I suspect that out in the field it was a different David to the one who pored over the instruction book with me when Jim wasn’t there. David is a marine biologist who wanted to be a farmer, but after growing and baling one hundred acres of sorghum on Bullo, I think he went back to the sea.

  The baler tried our patience to breaking point. Uncle Dick nearly rebuilt the whole machine. Mention the word baler and his eyes cross. The machine is supposed to gather up the windrows of cut sorghum and roll it into large bales about five feet in diameter, wrap string around the bale and spit this finished product out the back. ‘Supposed to’ is the key phrase. The baler would jam repeatedly after making the core of a bale and to unclog this monster, poor David had to nearly stand on his head, down in amongst spikes, and pull all the sorghum out by hand. To add to this problem, David suffered from hay fever. Many a time I would find David head down, tail up, muttering to himself, and sneezing and sniffling with sorghum flying in all directions.

  Finally, after Uncle Dick had replaced almost everything he could, we found the problem. At the bottom of the machine is a drum with ridges running along it every four inches. The drum turns, pulling the sorghum into the part of the machine that rolls the bales. The ridges had worn smooth and the sorghum was slipping and not feeding into the machine evenly. Uncle Dick welded new ridges onto the drum and we were suddenly baling sixty to eighty bales per day.

  It is a great sight, 660 five-foot bales of sorghum hay—at roughly four to a ton, that’s 165 tons of hay. It filled one whole holding paddock near the house and every animal within ten miles had one ambition, to get into that paddock.

  At the Katherine Show in June 1991, Bullo River won first prize in Pasture Regeneration, section ‘H’ agriculture, class H44. Our little venture was really a three-in-one project. We had ploughed in the weeds for weed control and when we planted the sorghum, we had also added grass seed, so with any luck, when it rains this wet, we should see one hundred acres of improved pasture of buffel and verano. This wet we hope to plant two hundred acres of sorghum and improved pasture.

  But I will be really happy when we are up to two thousand, and just imagine twenty thousand. Now that’s a dream to aim for—all our beautiful cattle knee-deep in feed every October and November.

  In February one of the big farming concerns on the Ord River irrigation closed down: machinery, workshop, ploughs, tools, everything was up for sale. Auctions are more addictive than drugs. Everything you see, you need, want or must have. I could quite easily have bought everything there—and waved a magic wand to move the magnificent storage shed over to Bullo. And of course everything I needed, which was almost everything, Jim needed. We would walk up to a lot and say, almost in unison, ‘I could use that.’ But everyone else there could no doubt have said the same thing; that was why we were all there.

  Between us, Jim and I bought a good percentage of the sale. Marlee would rush up to us and say, ‘Gee, that was cheap, we should have bought that.’

  ‘We did.’

  ‘Oh, good!’ And she would disappear into the crowd only to reappear and go through the same conversation.

  The third time this happened, she just looked at me and I nodded.

  Later she said to me, ‘I never saw Jim bidding.’

  I explained that you never see experienced auction goers bidding. I had been to an auction once with my sister Sue, and we had sat there for hours with Sue not moving a muscle.

  Later, at lunch, I had said, ‘Well, that was a slow morning. Do you think you’ll buy anything this afternoon?’

  ‘I bought most of the sale this morning.’

  I was amazed. My sister, before she retired, had dress shops in Sydney. At one time, she had three shops. She bought bankrupt stock and sold it at bargain prices. She ran a very successful business and had a talent for buying at auctions that was superior. Apparently it was all done with the eyes.

  Jim had a similar technique. I didn’t see him bidding, but somehow I would end up the owner. Of course I let him buy for me. When you have the talents of a professional at your disposal, I am a firm believer in standing back and letting them do their thing. Jim bought us a semi-trailer full of useful machinery and tools. Marlee was delighted.

  After the auction we flew to Cable Beach and enjoyed a week out, then it was back to the ever-expanding work load—Jim to his machines, and us to our cattle.

  On the 23rd of February I signed a contract to write this book. It was my dad’s birthday. I had agreed back in November to write a book and had, over the wet, put more than a third of it on paper, but the final contract was not signed until February. When I wrote the date after my signature and realised it was Poppa’s birthday, I thought, well, that has to make it a good book!

  Because of Saddam Hussein’s antics in the Gulf, the week in Hawaii was now a week in Cairns, which was a disappointment. I had to speak for forty minutes. As I was writing my speech, I realised I might be receiving a lot of money for the forty minutes it took me to say it, but it took days to write it. I ended up with twenty-two pages. After some weeks of changing and shaping it a few hundred times, I typed it up neatly and decided it would have to do. As the day approached, I became more and more nervous. Everyone around me noticed.

  ‘Come on, Mum, you can do it!’ Marlee kept saying. Dick also voiced his confidence.

  The speaking agency had given me pages of information on matters like what to wear, for example! But on the important details, such as, what the people were like, what walk of life, what age group and so on, nothing. I asked most of these questions myself but when I finally arrived for the great event, I realised I had been given the wrong information. I arrived Sunday night and was not speaking till Tuesday, so I spent Sunday night and most of Monday labouring over the rewrite. I am glad I did because the result was well received.

  In the Cairns newspaper the next morning, the reporter said I had started down the road of a new career!

  I then spoke on the Gold Coast for the Life Education Centre, Smile for Life. I spoke with Kay Cottee and Diane Cilento on courage, strength and success. Kay was courage, I was strength, Diane was success. I was very nervous that night but Kay and Diane were delightful and soon put me at ease.

  These two speeches were only two days apart, and afterwards I flew to Caloundra to spend a few days with Susan and Ralph. They had moved there recently and I had only seen photos of the house. It is called ‘Pandanus House’ and what a delightful home. It is very old and sits on the river bend, looking up the river and down the river and out to sea. All around is bushland and across the river is parkland, so sitting on the verandah, you cannot see any other houses. Then it was back to the station and mustering.

  At the beginning of April, the travel editor of the London Sunday Times, Mark Ottaway, arrived on Bullo to write a story about us. This was real prestige—the London Sunday Times no less. Mark is a terrific person and we had no end of fun during his stay. He sent us a copy of the article and said it was the biggest spread the travel section had done on any one place in twenty-five years.

  Soon after Mark left I was off to Rockhampton for my next speaking engagement. This was to open ‘Beef Expo 1991’. I wished so much that Marlee could have been there—all those magnificent cattle gathered together in one place. The Expo lasted for over a week, but I could
only stay for the opening and the cattle judging the next day. Marlee was in the middle of a muster and had to be away from the homestead all day and most nights and it was difficult for her to run the outside and the inside operations. Marlee is always glad to see me home as she really doesn’t like the business part.

  It was then into Katherine as Marlee was in a play. This was to raise money for the ‘Outback Hall of Fame’ women’s wing. It was a play about pioneer women and Marlee played the stockwoman working side-by-side with the men; it was the perfect casting for her. It was now her turn to be nervous and my turn to say, ‘Oh you’ll be alright, Marlee, nothing to it.’ Of course she carried it off beautifully. Then it was home again to mustering and to appear in a video for the Department of Primary Production and Fisheries for promotion of the Northern Territory overseas. I appeared in the land and cattle section of the video.

  I was now racing in and out of the station almost every ten days. Before the award, if I had left the station four times in a year it was considered a lot. Marlee said I was so busy she would soon have to make an appointment to see me. Between her being out mustering for days and my leaving every ten days, we did spend most of our time talking on the two-way radio, saying hello and goodbye.

  Our next muster was in the home paddocks. The yards are only one mile from the homestead, so Marlee was home at night. This was nice because I was off again soon, to Townsville.

  The 15th of June was the anniversary of Charles’s death. It was now five years since he had died. I had a drink at sunset, in the usual sunset drinking spot he had always favoured. I raised my glass to him and listened to Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1, our favourite piece of music. There was no sudden upheaval or bolt of lightning, so I suppose he was pleased with our work to date. I sat there until it was quite dark.