Life on the Land

Our guest today Mea Campbell is a lawyer by trade, who's good at making things happen and quick. Her massively successful social impact business was a daydream one day and a registered business the next. Within a year there was more 15,000 people signed up to take part, as well as schools and big business. ConnectedAU and its flagship The Letterbox Project, which is basically a pen pal project were inspired when Mea thought of her late grandfather and how lonely COVID lockdown would have made him. And Mea know’s loneliness too; in fact it triggered her own young family to pull up their roots near Walgett in NSW and moved to the regional city of Dubbo.

This story is about so much more than writing letter’s, it’s a different form of social and cultural education - breaking down stereotypes, creating connections between the generations – and as she says what’s she’s doing is changing people’s lives.

Thank you to our sponsor for this episode The Rockhampton Grammar School.

We are very close to sending the Winter edition of Graziher to the printers, so make sure you don't miss out on this lovely issue, the first with our new editor Victoria Carey, by subscribing at graziher.com.au

Driving home from work is the first chance Ali Cooper has to take a deep breath in her day. The mum of three is part of the CC Cooper & Co family farming empire, nearly two million acres spread across six properties across NSW, South Australia and WA.

If that’s not quite enough, Ali has also recently taken on Jamestown’s ‘The Park’, breathing new life into the cabins and caravan facilities. She leads a big, busy, full life married to fifth-generation farmer, Seth. The Coopers have been on a mission to expand and diversify their operation, contending with devastating droughts and floods along the way. Theirs is a story of unearthing opportunities and seizing the moment while dealing with the inevitable challenges along the way.

Thank you to today's sponsor RB Sellars.

RB Sellars is committed to remaining the affordable, accessible and fit for purpose Australian brand

it is so well known for.

You can help us to continue giving a voice to women and their stories in the bush by sharing this podcast with your circle – it helps us get found on all the important podcast lists. Don’t forget to check out our magazine in your local stockist, or gift a subscription to a friend at graziher.com.au.

Today’s guest is a household name in the Australian bush. It's Landline's Pip Courtney who's been gracing our TV screens for close to five decades.

There have been two men in Pip's life. Her biggest mentor was her journalist father who she rarely saw, except on Saturday’s, when Pip would listen on with eager ears as he dissected the style, tone and headlines of the weekend papers. And then there was John. I think we all follow Pip’s journey with a certain degree of affection having watched on in shock and dismay as she lost her cameraman husband John Bean, in a helicopter crash that also took the lives of reporter Paul Lockyer and pilot Gary Ticehurst. Despite it, all Pip still genuinely regards herself as the luckiest girl in the world.

Thank you to today's sponsor Marcus Oldham College.

This episode includes conversations about Depression, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and Mental ill-health, if you or anyone you know needs someone to speak with about any of these issues you can call LifeLine on 13 11 14 or Beyond Blue.

This week, we’re taking you into the belly of the Graziher team and flipping the mic so to speak. Emily Herbert’s silky words have graced the pages our magazine for 4 years and last year she joined the Life on the Land podcast team.

She's had a break from the podcast as she gave birth to a beautiful boy Huckleberry in January.

The more I get to know this women the more my awe and admiration grows. She’s ridden out a really tough year in 2020 as a self confessed COVID refugee, who got married, moved back in with her parents and then fell pregnant.

But in the scheme of things 2020 hasn’t been her toughest year, Em’s lived through a lot. When she was at University her best friend, Maddie took her life, which Em says split her in two. She suffered terribly including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and as she continues to work her way to better mental health, she’s also become a sensible, smart and incredible articulate advocate for this important issue – and we talk lots about this. The caveat is that Emily is not a health professional and this is her own version of her story, the advice is in no way supposed to be taken as professional.

We did start the interview on a happier note, by congratulating her on the birth of baby Huckleberry!

Emily has also written about her experience at University and beyond in this article for Mamamia.

And a warning before you press play - there's a bit of sensitive language in this podcast, so make sure young ears aren’t too close by. This episode also discusses topics of mental health. If you or someone who know needs someone to speak they can call Beyond Blue they offer immediate support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week on 1300 22 4636

When you’re 20 years old, can you remember what life was like? Maybe you're 20 now. Mostly it's dominated by work, well-lubricated social events and exploring the world.

This was definitely the case for Samantha Longmore from Binalong in southern New South Wales – until one night – something you could never imagine happened and for her, this carefree world was gone forever. One night, after working being called up to work a night shift at a nightclub in Canberra – Sammy had a car crash on the way home and then the ambulance she was travelling to the hospital in, also crashed and the injuries she sustained when she went flying through the front windscreen left her a hemiplegic and in a wheelchair for life.

I’ve told Sammy’s story a few times now – and you can probably hear that my voice still shakes a bit when I explain - it’s just so frightfully tragic. In her typically frank way, we speak about all things in this interview, about navigating doctors and the health system as a 20 year old, finding a boyfriend while in a wheelchair, what she loves about living the farm life and the development of her own baby, woollen knitwear business OhhBullDust.Tell your friends about Sammy – she is truly one of a kind – with a whole lot more life left to give.

You can find Sammy @ohhbulldust

Thank you to today's sponsor Allen and Unwin's novel Something to Hide by Fleur McDonald.

Our guest on Life on the Land this week is prolific rural fiction writer from Western Australian Fleur McDonald. In the last 12 years she’s written 18 books, the latest ‘Something to Hide’ is out this week. Long before Fleur was a writer, she was chasing the dream to be a farmer, hassling the patriarchy at every opportunity so she could build her skills and one-day own her own piece of land.

She realised this dream when she moved to Esperance in Western Australia but her story gradually became complex and difficult, even her writing had to be done in secret sometimes.

Fleur’s own tale is of a lifelong love of the land peppered with challenges; isolation, anxiety, divorce, disability and many disappointments.

Thank you to our Series Sponsor - Blundstone Australia.

Graziher's Autumn Edition is on sale now at your local stockist and for a limited time in selected Coles Stores. This issue is jam-packed with goodness so don't miss it.

From a school of the air childhood, where afternoon’s meant sticky hands from the

molasses feed run in the 90’s drought to riding bikes, chasing birds and starting mini-businesses, there emerged a girl with a quite confidence landing her as a lawyer, an ag-tech innovator and an exciting new advocate with an inimitable spark, that’s hard to extinguish.

Even in the wee hours of the early morning, while soothing sleepless babies, Elisha Parker is excited about the opportunity to spend time not catching up on sleep but working!!

Elisha is from Clermont in Central Queensland. Daytime means working full time as a lawyer.

Night-times mean fine tuning her innovative website cattlesales.com.au which she co-founded in 2015. There’s also two young children in the mix and handful of other community projects – not to mention the fact that she’s the QLD finalist for the Agrifutures Rural Women of the Year award this year. So what is the perfect childhood recipe to produce such a go-getter of women?

By the sounds of things is just a freedom to explore life possibilities.

Thank you to our Series Sponsor - Blundstone Australia.

Graziher's Autumn Edition is on sale now at your local stockist and for a limited time in selected Coles Stores. This issue is jam-packed with goodness so don't miss it.

If you haven't grown up on the land the foray into rural life is often closely followed by a the feeling of isolation, being separated from your people and different from your normal environment where everything you knew was familiar and ordered. Isolation is definitely not unique to the bush it’s a challenge that so many mothers in rural Australia have experienced.

Stephanie Trethewey is one of them and she’s making much of it. Her podcast, Motherland, interviewing ordinary and extraordinary rural Mum’s has had over 110,000 downloads.

Her new vocation is not what Steph ever imagined , she was born in Sydney and with a career as a TV reporter she had not a thought for a life on the land. But on a quiet news day while working in Queensland, she interviewed her now husband Sam Tretheway and thought he was kinda cute and the rest is history. This is her story!

Thank you to our Series Sponsor Blundstone Australia.

Stephanie has also written a piece for the Autumn edition of Graziher which is ON SALE NOW. If you are interested in purchasing a subscription for yourself or a friend visit graziher.com.au

This chick, ARIA award winning Australian country music singer and song writer Fanny Lumsden is a such a legend. The energy that she gives off even via a computer screen is pretty special. Fanny is a born to be entertainer, who somehow maintains the authenticity of a girl who’s grown up on a farm, she sees the true beauty of small communities (insert her Country Halls Tour) in Australia and yet has 8 golden guitars awards sitting on her mantle piece. And is still surprised at the ongoing success or her career.

Part of her story is what happened in 2020. One thing was bushfire - her home was in the middle of the Dunns Road fire. It became a mega-fire, 6-hundred thousand hectares in size. A proper Armageddon. Then on the day her 3rd Album was to be released – COVID lockdown hit. It was bad. We talk about this but not before we wind it back to a topic that’s is pure delight; her childhoods and the days of singing in the sheep shed and doing circus moves on the back of her horses!

Thank you to our series sponsor Blundstone Australia.

If you'd like to meet more women like Fanny, you can do so on the pages of our magazine Graziher. You can purchase a subscription at graziher.com.au

our latest guest was farmer, historian and author Maggie MacKellar who now lives in the tiny town on the east coast of Tasmania – as Maggie so beautifully told us in her interview released on Monday there’s been many bumps in her life. One thing that’s helped her process the blindsides that have beset her is writing and journalling, a discipline she does religiously each morning. Not only has it helped her overcome adversity but her words have become the basis of books and memoirs. So she shares with you, her practise and what it brings to her life on the land.