Gwendolyn Adams is not a landowner – she prefers to call herself a land manager.
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“We don’t own the land, we’re really just managing it for future generations.”
For more than 40 years Mrs Adams and her husband have managed her family’s 160-hectare property Leighlands at Perth and have watched the farm grow through many iterations.
“We used to mix crop, we’ve had poppies, seed crops, peas, we really had a go at everything, we always used to have cattle and we had Angora goats at some stage, but common sense prevailed,” she laughed.
The farm now boasts a 3000-strong Merino mob and prime lamb enterprise but there is one thing that has always remained constant – a strong desire to care for the land.
“If you don’t look after the soil, then nothing will grow properly, you won’t get anything out of it,” she said.
Mrs Adams aims to plant 1000 trees on her property each year and has worked with many school groups and young people to undertake land care activities on the farm.
Her efforts on her own property has earned her a place among the national finalists for the Bob Hawke Landcare Awards that will be presented at the national conference in Melbourne on September 21.
Mrs Adams was nominated by Lynley Chopping and she said it was an absolute surprise.
However she is no stranger to recognition – she was awarded an AM in 2005 for her services to landcare and the agriculture industry and was awarded the Stock and Land Primary Producer Landcare Award in 2001.
She said her desire to care for the land and to be involved in the community came from her mother, who also lived at the Leighland property.
“She was always looking at the garden, she hated the thistles, but we didn’t know then that it was really important to get rid of them. My mum was also always involved in community groups and activities.”
A role model for young people, Mrs Adams has also been hosting school groups from various primary schools, including East Launceston Primary School, Queechy Primary Schools and Newstead Heights.
Mrs Adams said having the children their from Newstead Heights was a “wonderful experience.”
“For 16 years we had students come, we took them into the shearing shed and then we’d do Landcare activities like planting trees,” she said.
She said she had been part of various programs, such as the now defunct Adopt A Farm program and Discover Agriculture.
The Adopt A Farm program would teach students about cattle pregnancy testing, sheep shearing and planting trees while Discover Agriculture is a program for school leavers to teach them about the myriad career opportunities available within the agriculture industry.
Mrs Adams said agriculture was often a hidden industry that was often only in the news because of the bad things that impacted on it.
“We need to keep people connected to the farm, life on the land is not all doom and gloom.”
“We had the kids from Newstead Heights come to the farm every month for a year,” she said.
“One of the boys, he had stopped responding emotionally but we sat him down on a rug with some of the [working dog] puppies to let them lick him to death and he just started laughing.”
Mrs Adams said the way childrens’ faces lit up when they were a part of landcare and farm activities had driven her passion.
“I just love it, it’s fun, and I love the way their little faces light up when they learn something new,” she said.
Education for “city” kids was vitally important as the connection between these people and the land is dwindling, Mrs Adams said.
“It used to be that ‘city kids’ would have a grandparent or an uncle, someone who was on the land so they had a bit of an understanding but that isn’t the case anymore,” she said.
However it’s not just kids Mrs Adams has supported – she was a founder for Tasmanian Women in Agriculture.
Mrs Adams said Rowena Bell, a vet at Mount Pleasant, helped her come up with the idea for Tasmanian Women in Agriculture as a way to bring young people together.
She said she wanted to create a network for rural women to come together and share their ideas and educate each other.
Tasmanian Women in Agriculture (TWiA) has groups across the state and there are now more than 1000 women connected to one of those groups.
“We wanted to create that support network, it was great to see women come out of their shells and learn together,” she said.
“Everyone jumped on board really quickly because it was fun.”
In addition to the Landcare accolade, 2016 has been a good year for Mrs Adams, after one of her fleece’s won reserve champion in the Australian Fleece Competition.
The global competition attracts more than 400 entries from around the world and is the largest fully measured fleece competition.
The competition is held as part of the Bendigo Sheep and Wool Show, that was held in July.
Agriculture reporter Caitlin Jarvis wants to celebrate the success of Tasmania’s rural women and will be running the Women in Agriculture series in the coming weeks. To nominate a rural woman email caitlin.jarvis@fairfaxmedia.com.au