BM
This is a West Wimmera Health Service podcast. Presented by me Brigitte Muir.
This series focuses around stories and issues related to health and wellbeing. Some of the people we hear from are sharing their stories, hoping that their experiences will help us with our own health and wellbeing. Please be aware that some of their life experiences may touch on issues that are sensitive to some. Please listen with care. You will find information on seeking help if you need it in the notes attached to each episode.
Mary Johnson wears many hats. She is a farmer in the Western District… an international Landcare educator, a volunteer and a researcher who travels extensively for her work.
MJ
I work for RMIT University. But I work mainly in the area of community development… agriculture and natural resource management. My background has been in agricultural science, but I've moved very quickly in my later years into social research. My passion… around that… is working with people, to understand how people work together.
BM
You are the daughter of farmers, aren’t you?
MJ
Yes.
BM
And you took over the family farm.
MJ
Yes.
BM
Did your parents grow in this area?
MJ
No. My parents were both from Melbourne originally, and they came up to Minhamite where we are, as soldiers settlers. I have six siblings, brothers and sisters. And yes, I'm the farmer in the family. But I've got to say that everybody loves to farm, so people come home to visit and we recruit them into special jobs when they come home.
BM
That's kind of unusual a daughter taking the farm over, isn't it?
MJ
Yeah, I guess so, my parents were… very… keen that we all had a really good education, and so that we would have choice in life about what…how what …what we wanted to follow. I'd always loved the farm. I used to find my father around and spend a lot of time in the paddocks with him and I think I was just… naturally drawn to farming as a way of life… in addition to a career.
BM
Now, you mentioned that, in your research work you… into looking into people working together, is that something that you see in the farming world around you here in the Western District?
MJ
Yeah… in previous years there have been strong communities, it's probably dissipated in recent, more recent decades, simply because… this area was soldier settlement in the 1950s. When that happened, the neighbours were very dependent on one another to share information… to share farming knowledge… to share equipment… a lot of people just didn't have the resources… that… engendered a spirit of cooperation and sharing between the soldier settlers. When you go into other localities or even within this locality where there's been generational farming… taking place, there does remain the sharing and the cooperation, but farms sizes have increased…. and where we are there's still a lot of family farms, but they tend to have got bigger. And so the impetus for sharing… is probably lessened somewhat. Get together on a social basis. And…and a lot of times it's the football or netball club, where people come together.
BM
What about volunteering?
MJ
Volunteering has been very strong. A lot of these sporting clubs in the little townships… heavily dependent on volunteers and that community spirit… to do things together and support one another… for activities and social events. But a little… a little disturbed to… hear and read about the status of volunteers post COVID, and I've seen it with the groups that I belong to, the memberships that I belong to, where memberships and volunteers are dropping off… for whatever reason, but I think that may well be to the detriment of communities in the long run, because… Australia's always had an extremely strong volunteer workforce… to do whatever. But… yeah… it's… it's a bit sad if it's… weakened in a weakened state.
We're not generational farmers to this area. We certainly have been… formed by the landscape that we've been farming in… and… being mindful of… the farmers who were here prior to occupation and I'm talking about the Indigenous people of this area that go back for 1000s and 1000s of years. We're just one little blip in that long connection that… with humans in the landscape here and we very aware of that. So there's an emotional connection… and I think that landscapes… really shape who we are, whether it's an urban cityscape or a rural scape, if there's a strong connectivity, to where you live, and where you work, and your surrounds, if that exists, I understand how that really influences what you do in life. And I've come to understand… over many years, the connection that… Indigenous people have to country and how incredibly important that is in a sense of a spiritual sense and philosophy about yourself and the place. It's very profound. And it does have profound effects on, particularly, people that are attuned to this.
BM
What changes have you seen in the landscape… since your parents moved here, since you were aware of?
MJ
My parents came to a highly degraded landscape because of the rabbit… rabbit plagues. My parents… along with all the other soldiers settlers of the area, had to remove the rabbits before they could start farming. And that was a huge job and has been an ongoing job ever since. The change that's come… since the 1950s …to the 1960s… my parents improved the pastures… in the paddocks for productivity… from the 1970s probably reaped the benefits of that. But in the 1980s and 1990s…when I started farming here, I thought that there was more to this country… than… simple pasture that there was a whole ecology. And we discovered that if we fenced off areas, the hard seeds of the black woods and the black wattles would regenerate. And so, the country was teaching us a lesson… in how to revegetate and regenerate. So, the changes have been… that we have come to realisation of how important it is to have those ecosystems… in synergy and in harmony with your productive areas of the farm. That's how we try and farm… here.
BM
You're working with the land instead of off the land.
MJ
Exactly.
BM
And it's a much more long term vision of…
MJ
it is…
BM
living?
MJ
Well, it is. And as we've just, you know, we talked about and landscape can shape… people, I had the great… good fortune and pleasure of working with Indigenous communities, and… we invited a young Indigenous team to our farm. And we walked the farm. And we talked about the farm. And we started to see… what they were seeing through their eyes, a different sort of a landscape. Now… Philip and I were very well aware that our landscape had been part of… an Indigenous way of life, because we see… scatters, and rocks and, and stone implements… right through the landscape, especially if there's a rabbit borough and there's been rain, they dig them up, and they flick these out.
BM
Now, as a farmer, and as a woman living on a farm… what does health and wellbeing mean to you?
MJ
As a woman living on a farm and a farmer who's getting a little bit older… I'm starting to feel the physical challenges of farming. And… I should really put a caveat on this because a lot of my work is with… the university as a researcher, I tend to do my farming tasks, I help my partner Phillip when I can, but as not as much as I used to do. However, saying that I help at peak times… through shearing… or through landmarking… or whenever, and… I find that… to my surprise and concern that I'm not as physically fit… as I once was to do the work that I need to do. And… I know Philip, for example, after a hard day's physical work on the farm… then he's much more tired and he's worn out, we're both getting worn out. So, from a health perspective… I need to be fitter I'm well aware of that. But there's also a wellbeing factor… that goes along with this… and I… will just use Philip and myself as examples. I… find… that when I'm working on the farm, that my batteries are recharged. I'm out there…I’m working on the land with nature… or with sheep, which I love… cattle I love too. And for my mental wellbeing… I find that it really recharges me and reinvigorates me. And I feel terrific after doing a… a hard day's work or a day's work on the farm. The flip side to that is Phil, who every day is a hard day's work on the farm. And… so it doesn't have the same impact for him. He's… meeting the daily challenges and stresses of farming… all the time. And so… you know, you can manage so much, but you can't manage the weather for example. So, his wellbeing, I don't know that he gets a stimulation out of the farm that I certainly do. He's a terrific reader. And he's a… an amateur historian. So he goes to those places… for a rest… from the farm. I guess if you were just focused on farming all the time, although… it could possibly be… I think, I think you need a break from it. Whereas for me, I need a break… from… my work at a computer. And I find that being in the landscape and being on the farm.
BM
Yes, holidays?
MJ
Funny, you should say that because we are actually taking a few days off this weekend. And pre COVID… Philip and I went on a holiday to the UK and… took several weeks off… I was…trying to… demand three months away from the farm. But the compromise came down to about eight weeks. And we put on a farm manager, we were really lucky, we had a wonderful neighbour… who… came and looked after the farm. And we were able to do that. But over the years, we probably should have taken more time off the farm… to get away because in doing that you come back refreshed, and you tend to come back and see things through different eyes again… then you can… you know, meet the challenges, hopefully.
BM
Is there anything else that you would like to share with people… about farming… about farming, about living on the farm… about mental health… about being a woman on the farm? Anything? [chuckles]
MJ
Well, I consider myself really fortunate because I've been in a position where I can both… have my farm, but also have a career outside the farm. I've only been able to do that… through… the support of my partner, Philip, I'm not always here and my work does take me away… overseas at times… well pre COVID and post COVID. So, there are times when I'm away for… relatively long-ish periods of time. But my… love has been farm… and farming families and farming community I love… I love the communities… that are built up around the farms… as farms that are businesses. And we do run this farm as a business well, and truly. I love the fact that we've been able to… grow with this landscape and understand it better and understand that our farming practices of the past… were probably not the best practices and that there are opportunities where you can… certainly where you can balance conservation, natural resource management and production… on the same area and the ability to be able to do that. So I feel that I've been really fortunate. My children… have had the pleasure of growing up on a farm. They're not going to be farmers and neither are any of my nieces or nephews, but it's certainly been… a place… that was a haven in a way… and I think it was a choice of my father post… repatriation after World War Two back in Melbourne. He and my mother… lived in Melbourne for five years, but he'd needed… he needed to get out of Melbourne and he wanted to… go back farming. He…he’d actually come from a farming family but he wanted to return to farming and he thought that that would be a good life for my mother and the… and the growing family. And so it has been… and I've been very thankful and grateful for that.
BM
I think you can be.
MJ
[chuckles]
BM
It’s wonderful living in the country, isn’t it?
MJ
Yeah… it's certainly is
BM
Thank you so much for that, it's been absolutely… very special and a privilege talking with you.
MJ
Thank you, Brigitte.
BM
That was Mary Johnson from Minhamite, in the Western District.
You will find as always contact numbers and details in the notes attached to this episode. And while you're at it, please give us a star rating. We'd also love to hear your comments and suggestions. Our Facebook and Twitter details are in the notes. Until next have a healthy life won’t you.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai edited by the WWHS Health Promotion Team.