Chapter 14 – Life, Barmies and Chicken Armies

It has been a few weeks since I last wrote about our farming life. It is not that I have been slack. OK, well maybe a bit slack. But it’s more to do with everything going on with the Moringa ban from FSANZ and its repercussions occupying a fair amount of my time

This Moringa ban is not something I want to keep writing about, keep whinging about or bore you with. Just know we are fighting it tooth and nail and we should have a positive outcome in the near future. If all things go to plan, that is. So I won’t dwell on it here.

Our federal petition ended with over 3,100 signatures which is a great entry point to prove that Moringa is well loved in Australia and a terrible mistake was made. I have managed to work around the regulations using some tricky ideas and tactics. Other businesses have not and I fear it won’t be long before my loophole is closed as well. But until then, I have managed to get Moringa back through customs completely legally.

But enough of that for now. I have written an article in regards to what exactly has happened and if you are interested you can read it here

Let’s get back to farm life.

How Quick Things Can Turn

It’s easy to become overconfident in your surroundings. Become comfortable with the machines you use and the equipment lying around. The lay of the land becomes somewhat easy to traverse and life becomes a routine. But I had a mishap on the tractor and it rattled me quite a bit.

I was using the tractor to move firewood for a nice big bonfire for when my sister arrives, and I seemed to have bitten off more than I could chew. It took quite a long time to tie my sling around this tree log that I cut in half with my chainsaw. It was heavy and I tried to distribute the weight evenly. However, it was more top-heavy so this meant carrying it vertically and higher than I should have.

Driving the log up to the house seemed to be fine, I had control. Nice and slow movement and I kept the log a little off the ground as I travelled up the hill and into my front yard. Since the fence was built, there is only one way in and out using a big gate. The issue I have since learned is I placed it right before an uneven hill down. And of course, the fire pit is at the bottom of that.

Now that the tractor was about to travel down instead of up, I lifted the bucket higher to keep the log off the ground. Once I started the descent the log was too heavy and it lifted my back left tyre off the ground. Yeah, those big tyres that weigh a tonne. I know as I have had to change the bloody thing so many times. The tyre goes up, the tractor drastically shifts to the right with the uneven slope. I get thrown to the side and all I can see is the star picket that I think I am about to come crashing down on.

The tractor held though. One wheel off the ground, I coached it down the small hill and away from danger. In that situation I probably should have dropped the bucket to lessen the load, but in that split second you make your decision, I was more worried about impaling myself on a star picket. My wife would have had the shock of her life seeing me evolve into a human kebab.

After I took the load off the front by lowering the bucket, the tractor went back to four wheels and I went to get a change of pants.

Lessons learnt, but I am still quite shaken when on the tractor now. I am much more cautious. I hate learning lessons the hard way.

John & Deere, Meet John Deere

After the spectacular failure of my Husqvarna lawnmower and the failure of my goats John & Deere, I bit the bullet and bought an actual John Deere zero-turn ride-on mower. What a machine. Unlike the Husqvarna, it starts, cuts lawns and runs longer than five minutes without breaking down. Unlike the bloody goats John & Deere, it doesn’t break fences, leap 1.2m, climb over tractors, eat banana plants and generally everything but grass. This machine really eats grass.

I also bought a small trailer that hooks to the back of it. This way I can take tools around the farm with me, bring back cut wood and so much more. A real game changer in my eyes. It’s probably not great for my exercise as I just drive everywhere now instead of walking and carrying tools around. Then walking back and forth fifteen times as I forget the tools I need. Now I just zip around on an actual John Deere.

The goats still manage to follow me everywhere however. Deere can clear a 1.2m fence quite easily which drives me nuts. I have fixed the fence so many times. John won’t jump though so as long as he is locked up, Deere does not go too far. But Deere has a habit of pulling fences down so John can just walk over it. The hours I have spent repairing the fence line, adding new star pickets, tensioning wires, Deere just cleanly leaps the damn thing now.

My next resort will be an electric fence. The issue is I don’t want our dogs to touch it and this fence is connected to the chicken enclosure Chookrassic Park. I love my chickens and I am not ready to BBQ them as of yet.

So this is a project to work on in the upcoming weeks. I will make a separate fence line inside with star pickets and run the electric fence on the inside. But everything I have tried to do so far has resulted in a big f**k you from Deere as he escapes within seconds of a repair job.

As much as I love these goats, I need to protect my Moringa trees come spring when I am planting them around the farm.

Moringa Seeds, Sowing & Destruction

I ordered a few types of Moringa seeds from multiple sources across the globe. I am always chasing the PKM1 Moringa seed for its yield and growth rate. But over the years I have had thousands of seeds and dollars destroyed at the border. This has made it quite an expensive adventure over time. But now, before anything had arrived, I got a letter from DAFF saying they destroyed my seeds.

As much as I want to get up them for it, it’s on me this time. The paperwork was not right from the supplier's end and I needed to check it much better than I did. I’m sure there is an excuse in there somewhere but it is irrelevant. I made the error, they destroyed the seeds. The reasoning was fair. It’s just another kick in the guts but this one should have been avoidable.

As this was happening a lovely customer sent me some of her seeds from her own trees. I could not believe how thoughtful this was and how happy I was to receive them. I planted them straight away and they have been growing in small pots waiting for spring before they move to their forever

A couple of weeks later, to my surprise, a box of seeds arrived. One box made it through from another supplier overseas. I had thought they were destroyed but it turns out they did not destroy all of the shipments. Just the one. I also had some new species of Moringa arrive that I want to plant separately. These are other variations of Moringa such as Stenopetala and more. I will be able to test and grow different varieties now.

The best part of this news is the seeds have been propagating over 90% so far. That not only means I have enough to plant here, I can send some to other local farms and sell some online. Since the ban the seeds have been hot property and there is not a day that goes by where I am not asked if I sell seeds. So this has been an unexpected surprise and a real positive outcome in what has been a hard few months. There is not a major profit in seeds, I would need to charge more than I care to admit to make back all the money I have lost over the years trying to get them here. But it’s a great start and a way to get this highly coveted variation of Moringa seeds to the Australian public which has been very hard to obtain.

Spring should be good, I am growing seedlings like crazy at the moment. Now I better learn how to get them into bags and into the ground without them dying.

I’m Not the Only One With a Taste For Moringa

Every day or two I walk down to the field to see how my Moringa is growing. The ones I planted when I first got up here went into the ground around February. The growth is stunted unfortunately. These will be good one day but they will take a long time to grow, provided they are not eaten first.

The area is fenced off to keep the roos out, this was the main reason I wanted to try this patch out. I drilled big holes, hooked up irrigation, watered them manually before that was set up and even sang to them, all to watch them wither and die one by one. In hindsight it is most likely my soothing tone that is reminiscent of scratching a chalkboard that did them in. A few survived however. Some are going well and I think spring will see them come back to life. A lot are just withering away to nothing, and the newer ones are being eaten.

I think it is field mice getting into it though. I have seen one in the area as I was cleaning it out and I know they will dig into the mounds I make. I keep seeing little moringa seedlings ripped out onto the ground next to the mounds I have been planting them in.

I am very glad I never planted thousands in one go. This has been one hell of a learning curve. Turns out a few of the critical mistakes I made are:

• Drilling holes with an auger looks right, but it leaves the plants prone to flooding.
• The holes are soft at the start, but the sides become tougher, which makes the roots struggle to break through.
• Mounding them works a bit, but it makes them prone to animals now and the roots struggle when getting to the soil level.
• The irrigation is struggling to break through the solid ground and overwatering them is killing them. So I am managing to kill them by overwatering and underwatering at the same time. Great work.
• The surrounding trees are blocking a lot of the sun in winter and they are not getting enough light. They roast in the warmer months though.

These are a handful of the issues I am seeing, but I am understanding it much better. Hard lessons, but smart lessons. I am taking a while to get things going but I am not losing so much at once that it will cripple me. Thankfully I can still get Moringa from my farm overseas. Oh and before you ask, yes they give me tips. No they don’t have the conditions like we do. They actually have soft, fertile ground and water that falls from the sky. I have scorched, cracked Earth and rough irrigation lines. On the not-so-bright side, we get lots of cloud cover without rain and this stops my solar working and watering them.

So, I am going to try the 100-litre bags in spring. This will give the tree a lot of room to grow and then the roots might be strong enough to break down and into our solid dirt. The biggest issue is water, and it’s a lack of rain that makes the ground go this way. We have had 2 rain events since February and the ground is just so dry it is very hard to do anything. Cracking, scorched, dying grass. Even the lantana is struggling. The rat's tail is fine though, it just keeps coming back…

My Chicken Army

After buying 10 Isa Brown chickens, keeping the original four chickens, which I call the Derpy crew, and being given a rooster by my neighbour, I have enough chickens to march to battle with. And march they do. They follow me everywhere as well. All 15 of them. They walk the yard with me, fanning out on each side in an uneven yet beautiful battle stance. They come into my workshop when I am working on machinery shitting everywhere they can. They are unreal at cleaning scraps but one thing they don’t seem to do is lay bloody eggs.

14 hens and a rooster. I get one egg a day if I am lucky. The Derpy crew went off the lay for a month and a half but are slowly starting up again. I hope these Isa Browns get their act together. The day I don’t have to buy eggs anymore is going to be a great day. They are ex-layers so I can’t expect too much out of them. I think in time, as they settle, finish moulting and spring arrives, I will see an influx in eggs.

With the partial success of the chickens, I am going to move to Guinea Fowl next. I will be picking these up in the next week or so and they will be moving next door to the chickens for a while before they are let loose to go on insect and tick control. I hope they will alert and scare snakes away as well. But we will see.

I have been told they are difficult to cage but I hope they stay in the area. Little guard birds seem like a great idea.

For someone who was not going to buy any animals for the farm and keep it agricultural only, I have really let myself go.

Maybe I will look into geese next? Knowing my impulsiveness it will probably end up being cows and horses.

Ahh well, one of these days I will grow Moringa in bulk, and have a steady supply of eggs. It’s all part of the learning and enjoyable lifestyle of living on a farm.

About the Author

Joel Molloy is the founder of Moringa Products Australia and author of the Moringa Farm Chronicles, documenting the challenges, successes and occasional disasters of establishing a Moringa farm in regional Queensland.

Alongside growing Moringa and developing sustainable farming practices, Joel has been actively involved in challenging the FSANZ Moringa decision, advocating for Australian consumers, growers and businesses that have been affected by the ruling.

Through the Chronicles he shares the realities of farm life, lessons learned from growing Moringa in Australian conditions and the ongoing effort to secure a future for Moringa in Australia.