Planting flowers in the middle of a drought doesn't seem like the obvious choice to diversify but this family has said goodbye to sheep and hello to hundreds of Geraldton wax plants.
abc.net.au/news/nindigully-sheep-farm-becomes-geraldton-wax-oasis/102787600After putting their "beautiful" merino ewes on a truck, Allie Hill's husband sat her down to ask for ideas on how they could diversify."I was on maternity leave, we had a six-month-old baby … we had no crops, we had no pasture, we'd fed for too long and couldn't afford to keep feeding."
"He [Allie's husband Nico] was like you need a business plan, you need to be able to show me the profits you're going to make and that was a little bit difficult."Kasey Lockwood of Handmade St George said people wait to get their hands on Ms Hill's flowers. "It's not something that you've been able to do in St George before so I think it's been embraced by the community because of that."Ms Hill said she tried to keep flower prices "reasonable" so the local community could afford to enjoy the flowers."I think what really pushed that flower market was COVID because during COVID nobody could see anyone so they all decided to start sending flowers to loved ones.
"So it is a lot of behind the scenes and then there's a lot of watering, fertilising, mulching, weeding, it's never-ending," she said.Ms Hill said it had made the family's already-busy life — with farming, young children and her work as a teacher — even busier. "It's been amazing to watch Allie grow that [flower] business from the ground up from nothing to what it is today," Ms Lockwood said.
With another potentially dry season around the corner, Ms Hill said the venture had turned out to be more of a hobby.Allie Hill says growing Geraldton wax is a lot of hard work.
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