Organic Insights Magazine - Spring 2023

4 / Organic Insights / Spring 2023

Declaring that he “was going to make an organic farm”, Adrian Strachan walked out of an Industrial Design course at college in the 70’s and never looked back. “I liked making stuff, designing stuff, but dreamt of building a farm that was integrated with the surrounding ecology,” he says. This yearning was partly influenced by a childhood surrounded by market gardens on the river flats of Paradise, in what is now suburban Adelaide. Early work experience on an organic orange farm in the Torrens Valley provided an awakening interest; while a later career job with stock agent Bennett and Fisher enabled him to observe a number of different farming systems. But it was visiting the then ‘hippy’ areas in Northern NSWwhere multiple occupancy (MO) bush building blocks in rich farming country were selling for as little as $1,000 that really got Adrian started. “It was totally inspiring, the community, seeing the houses that were built from salvage, frommud brick, stone and timber - and some good growing practices,” he says. “My conversion was total; I was going to do it!” So began Adrian’s search for the right farm property; a difficult journey which took 3 successive attempts. “My first block inWillunga was billy goat country,” says Adrian and, after surviving an accident, he realised that the hills were just too hard. “I then bought a property in McLaren Vale, and built up a herb farm and nursery called Yakatoon Herbs. It was where I first started growing stuff to sell.” “During this time, I met and married my lovely wife Robin and later had two children, Tasman and Mollie.”

After 7 years, the couple sold up after finding themselves the target of some pointed harassment, which culminated in several thefts from the block, including tools and equipment. “I was receiving constant cynicism and bullying from all types of people who ‘knew best’, but surprisingly it was the ‘alternative lifestylers’ who were worst,” says Adrian. It was then that the family moved to their current property in Sellicks Hill. “During the late-80’s, a number of almond blocks were being let go in the area,” he says. Most were replanted to grapes. By the mid-90’s, the wine industry was experiencing a renaissance in the district after the great vine pull scheme of the 80’s. The move marked Adrian’s decision to focus on mainstream crops to grow organically. “I knew if this was successful, that it would surely help the relevance of biological farming,” he says. “We had bumper almond crops in the first years, but many of the trees had Phytophthora, a fungal root disease which caused a rapid decline after ceasing herbicide use. So, we started replanting more and more young trees.” Rows of olive trees (Kalamata, Koroneiki and Frantoio) were also planted, that are now processed in the purpose built olive shed on farm for sale as table olives and olive oil, direct through a network of wholesalers and retailers. “We’ve been lucky with the olives; we had a number of Italian and Greek guys who helped, we were

welcomed into families, and were proudly shown their management methods; and we hadWWOOFers on the farm for 10-15 years before the visa legislation changed.” Adrian also did a lot of research and participated in olive seminars, including hosting on the farm. Celebrating 30 years of treading an alternative path WILLUNGA HILLS ORGANIC – ADRIAN AND ROBIN STRACHAN

Louis Hoang / Unsplash