About

Description, Overview & Direction

Our Vision: To be a model of restorative natural agriculture, growing bio-diversity and building environmental capital; to be shared for the benefit of future generations.

Mulloon Creek Natural Farms is a grazing, cropping and carbon building enterprise covering two farms in close proximity to each other on the Mulloon Creek, east of Canberra, towards the coast and approximately 280 km south of Sydney. The total holding is 2300 hectares or 5700 acres, with one property, “The Home Farm” covering 4300 acres and the other, “Duralla”, covering 1450 acres. The former occupies all of a small valley adjacent to and straddling the Great Dividing Range and the other is in more open country. On “The Home Farm” there is approximately 1800 acres of native forest.

Both properties are organic using the biodynamic system of agriculture and MCNF is a member of the Biological Farmers of Australia (BFA). Our purpose is to be a diverse, sustainable working role model of excellence for profitable biodynamic production and landscape restoration together with outstanding research and education programmes.

Our farms are certified ‘A’ grade biodynamic. Everything starts with the biological dynamism of the soil itself where we respect and encourage through our methods the dynamic inter-relationship of the flora and fauna within the soil and the connections and influence of the unseen but measurable cosmic forces. The founder of biodynamic agriculture, Rudolph Steiner, 80 years ago said, “The knowledge and working together of the cosmic and the terrestrial factors is the first objective of agricultural science.” The biodynamic practitioner balances these two realms through knowledge of how the terrestrial and cosmic forces work. This “life force” in the soil, plants and animals is what the peasant farmers of old and the ancients understood, and is what we believe is lacking today - “lifeforce” is the goal that goes beyond just “nutrition”.

When we plant crops we always under sow with other species, and when we plant a pasture we plant many varieties. The animals on Mulloon Creek Natural Farms graze on a menu of crops selected for their optimum health. In our system each animal and each plant must live its own distinctiveness, e.g. cattle are not fed grain, nor are they confined in feed lot conditions, as this is both unnatural and stressful for the animal (and is detrimental to the quality of the meat).

The current enterprises are cattle for beef and veal; sheep for wool and meat and poultry that graze all day out on pasture from sheds that are regularly moved, ensuring wholesome eggs. Our dairy cows produce milk, butter and cream. Pigs on pasture as well as meat from poultry may be recommenced after the drought. We plan to have other enterprises over time.

As a hobby we raise horses on the farm and, in line with our philosophy, use methods of ‘natural horsemanship’ to train them. We have facilities for training people and horses from outside the farm.

All staff on the farm contribute to all enterprises, even though some are more specialized in one or two enterprises than in others. In selling our products we maintain our independence and as much control as we can over the prices our products obtain by selling direct to retailers. We plan to sell direct to the public in the future. It is also our philosophy to provide food to the local community rather than “the other side of the world”.

Mulloon Creek Natural Farms has become a centre of learning. Courses in the theory and practice of biodynamic farming are held in liaison with the Biodynamic Education Centre run by Lynette West, a key person in our advisory team. We already have an education and research programme established with the Australian National University 20 years ago for forestry students who are carrying out experiments and studying developments of the native bush, and we are currently discussing with ANU expanding this to other disciplines. Our self-funding “events” programme also includes entertainment using an old barn on The Home Farm.

It is important to us that the introduced agriculture on the farm be integrated with the natural bio-diverse ecosystem. Our endeavour must add to our environmental capital, not take from it and reduce it.

A key element in our work is the rehydration of our landscape using the principles of Natural Sequence Farming developed and practiced by Peter Andrews. We believe that no matter what form of farming we use, even organic and biodynamic, nothing can work optimally without the foundation of the land being properly hydrated. We have the first National Landcare coordinated demonstration of this work on our creek. It is a model of a cooperative effort between Landcare, the Southern Rivers Catchment Management Authority and us as the landowners. The aim is to rehydrate our land to what it was originally before the extended degradation took place from grazing practices of the past 150 years. From this we build carbon from a healthy and diverse green surface area of plants that we believe is essential to the tempering of our climate for future generations.

A structure is in place to ensure MCNF goes on beyond us indefinitely into the future. This is to ensure that the long term benefits of the research and development in the biodynamic farming, the bush initiatives, re-balancing of the “natural sequence” of hydration, and the education continue uninterrupted.

However, this does not remove the importance of and the commitment to maximizing profitability and cash flow, even though that is “ploughed back” into the farms.

Hopefully our success, tempered by our mistakes, but made lighter by our sense of humor, will continue to make a contribution to restorative natural farming as well as the natural eco system, and most importantly to the dignity of the farmer, and to all those who benefit from healthy farming, both from working in this exciting environment and consuming the food and fibre.

Our Definition

“Model”: A standard to be imitated, a representative form, style or pattern. (Collins Dictionary)
“Restorative”: Tending to revive or renew health, spirits, etc. (Collins Dictionary)
“Restorative Natural Agricultural” means a system whereby the farm restores itself environmentally and sustains itself socially and economically. This includes farming methods of organic, biodynamic, natural sequence, permaculture and holistic management.
“Growing Bio-diversity” refers to the importance of both biological and enterprise diversity.
“Environmental Capital” is defined as the wealth of natural resources, especially the soil, water and plants.
“Sharing” is defined as welcoming what we can learn from others and giving others the benefit of our knowledge and experience.

Decision Making Protocol

All decisions in the running of MCNF are made to satisfy the criteria of our vision.