William Anderson

More good tips! Thanks.
Michael - just to answer your question it's a young plantation. It was planted I'm guessing around 2009 and then the trees were all cut down for pulp wood 2 years ago. So the regrowth is now about 2 meters high, but with multi-stems coming off the trunk as you would expect from coppicing. Looking into this particualr variety of Eucaplytus it does seem to have a shortish life from coppicing i.e. you can seemingly only do it up to about 5 times. I had a look through the link to the USDA document which was pretty thorough: it's both good firewood, charcoal and pulpwood.
I'm going to look into silvopasture as this could be a possible solution, however considering the overall area under plantation (and the low price that pulpwood is fetching), we will need to thin - I just need to work out the options.
Cheers
Will

Hi all these are some great suggestions, and food for thought.

As to your question of Blue Eucalyptus. Yes this is a native tree to Australia, but Tasmania not Victoria. It's a tree that is widely used for plantation.
We definitely plan to keep a significant chunk (for fuel and building materials (and fence posts good idea!) and will interplant with trees that would have grown here. We're doing some research on the tree types that would have grown here, ALONG time ago as before the plantation it was pasture for sheep. But before that the whole area was forest. It's unclear whether the remnant eucalypts (not blue gum) on the property are originals or pioneers when it was settled.

However either way the Blue Eucalyptus is not a tree that would normally grow here and has really been planted as a monocrop (grid layout in rows, much like a pine plantation). They're also a very competitive tree, with root systems that make it difficult for other plants to thrive. So not an ideal tree system to keep at scale.

Rose I hadn't thought about the ecological function they might offer and one thing they could provide is wind and sun shelter to help the trees get a head start.

Will go searching on PRI, I had an initial look but as you say it's not setup that well to find articles on there.

Cheers
Will

Hi there,
We're in the process of buying land and have come across what we think could be perfect, in terms of place, orientation, etc however it is currently been planted (around 150 acres or so) with blue eucalyptus as part of a government initiative here in Australia. It has been clear cut once, and the stumps are now all re-growing (apparently you can coppice blue gums in this way about 6 times). The land comes much more cheaply (than normal pasture), because it has been damaged by the plantation. We like the idea of regenerating poor farm land, however this is a lot of plantation to re-convert. Almost a scary amount.

Ultimately we'd want to turn a chunk back into native forest, a chunk into pasture land for sheep and possible cattle and a chunk into a food forrest / orchard of some description.

Does anyone know what the best way to possibly tackle this might be? The farmer started bulldosing about 20 acres, which has created a horrible scar. I'd love to avoid doing that, but I'm not sure how to approach it. Any tips, advice or pointers where I can research this more would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks
Will

Hey just wanted to say what a fantastic podcast series. I've been keeping bees for a couple of years now following the traditional method and have been thinking myself that there's got to be a better way.

In fact this year I developed a major allergy to bee venom and have to undergo a bee sting immunotherapy course, what's interesting about that is I wasn't able to open, look or manipulate the hive in any way for the best part of a whole season... When I was finally given the all clear and had a peep in my hive it was amazing, not only was there oodles of honey, but I've never seen the hive in such a good state, there was only one word to describe them powerful. They were fully expressing their beeness, and I suspect it was because I hadn't touched them for about 5 months.

You're definitely onto something here, feels to me it could be another Kickstarter video...?

Will

I'm with some of the other comments here, the whole streaming things isn't so good here (in Australia). I nearly did the upgrade to the $150, option, as I thought that would be a fantastic way to see the RMH vids, but when I realised it was streaming, I had to pull out. I'd prefer a direct download option but appreciate there's a risk (probably quite high) that it might find its way onto youtube and aired for free...

There is a risk if you offer too many kickstarter type projects a year though there will be burn out. But then again I have no idea how many people you have on your mailing list!