arts and design

Before and after the drought: how one Australian family farm sprang back to life – in pictures

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Somewhere in the pictures of Benjamin Wild’s photographs of Gradgery Cemetery, there’s a metaphor of loss, despair and then hope that’s bursting to escape.

Wild, 40, is the youngest of four to have grown up on the farm that’s been in the family for six generations and which sits across the road from those gravestones.

The first owner, John Wild, died in 1845 and lies in one of the graves that’s now barely visible, swamped by a burst of new pasture.

Gradgery Graves- December 2019 and then again in March 2020

Only six months ago, the headstone stood clear from the dusty ground at the end of one of the sharpest and deepest droughts in living memory.

“[The graveyard’s] anchor for me both in a family and in a landscape sense. It’s where I want to be when my time comes.”

The family’s Merenele property, about 130km northwest of Dubbo in central New South Wales, is on the land of the Weilwan people.

With camera in hand, the cemetery is one of more than 50 locations that Wild has been returning to in around the family farm since 2016, capturing the place’s journey into drought and then its spectacular road out – a journey not quite complete.

Merenele House in June 2019 then again in March 2020

“You find yourself in the same positions – you go through the same gates and you see the same things,” Wild says.

Wild says usually the farm gets 470mm rain a year. In 2018, 178mm fell. In 2019, only 127mm fell.

So far in 2020, Wild says more than 500mm has fallen on the cattle and wheat property.

Photographs Wild took in December 2019 and then again in March 2020 show the area escape from a moonscape of rocks, dust and dry creek beds.

Front Gate in December 2019 and then again in March 2020

“It was probably the longest prolonged dry period in recorded history. We really did get to a dire situation with a lot of these townships looking at day zero and not knowing what was going to happen.”

Merenele is now run by a caretaker with Benjamin’s father John, 71, and mother Vicky, 70, living in the nearby township of Warren.

Benjamin Wild, an occupational therapist and poet, lives in Lismore, but goes back regularly to Merenele.

The Weir in December 2019 and then again in March 2020

“I had a really strong affinity with nature growing up,” Wild says. “I was very much attuned to it. I used to collect seeds and rocks and fill up my drawers with all the junk I found.”

Benjamin was born and raised on the farm with his two older sisters Julia and Kate, and older brother Tom.

“It was just a state of freedom but, on reflection, it’s growing up in a workplace. Mum and dad were always around and I’d be out shooting or doing farm work. It becomes ingrained in you.”

Horse Paddock January 2020 and then again in March 2020

In a good year, the farm now runs more than 400 Shorthorn Charolais cross cows but by December 2019 as Benjamin returned for Christmas, they had de-stocked to 50.

He remembers taking a picture as he entered one of the property’s main grazing paddocks, with a cow in the foreground.

“That was a horrible day – hot and windy. We were out feeding all day and it was filthy. It would blow a dog off a chain,” he says.

“That day showed just how bad it could get. Dad has been out there all his life and it’s rare that the ground gets stripped back to the bone.”

January 2019 and then again in March 2020

The farm faced a bill of about $10,000 every six weeks just to feed the cattle.

“The biggest commitment is just keeping everything alive,” Benjamin says.

Wild’s photographs show the paddocks returning to life, and the creeks and rivers of the property and other spots close by filling with rain.

Near Pilliga in January 2020 and then again in March 2020

Marthaguy Creek that forms the eastern boundary of the property was a place Wild watched black cockatoos and water rats play. He doesn’t see those anymore.

“The saddest thing has been the numbers of tree deaths over recent years. That stands out for me.”

Bore paddock in January 2019 and then again in March 2020

Wild says the region has always had variable weather – with cycles of wet and dry – but he feels something has changed.

“I feel like a tourist in my own town because I go back and see these extreme changes. It would always get to 38 or 40 degrees (centigrade) in the late summer, but recently it’s been getting up into the 45s and 47s for extended periods.

“I hear the climate change denial in people, and I ask them when was the last time the Arctic and Antarctic was melting?”

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