In our previous home, I used to really enjoy the occasional bath. It’s wonderfully relaxing, and it gives you some quiet time to reflect, plan, and come up with new ideas. Being on tank water in our new house, we can’t afford the luxury of wasting so much water, so we don’t have a bath installed. Short showers just aren’t the same!

Little wonder then that this idea took me three years to come up with – seeing as I didn’t have a bathtub in which to think it.

I got an old pressed metal and enamel bathtub from the tip shop for $30. I temporarily mounted it on besser blocks (cinder blocks) on a concrete pad behind the house. I filled it from our garden water tank (not drinking quality, but still pretty clean). Since the tank is full and we’re in the middle of a rainy patch, we can spare the water at the moment.

Then I lit a fire under it:

About an hour later, it was nice and toasty. A hillbilly hot tub!

Lying in a bath, watching the stars, listening to the frogs and crickets: pure awesome.

An unanticipated side benefit is that the fire keeps the water warm for much longer than a normal bath would. So you can stay in for hours!

One tip: you need to find a flat piece of wood to sit on, or you’ll scald yourself on the hot metal directly above the fire.

This was such a success that I’m planning to find a permanent spot for it in the garden. I’m thinking a privacy screen of bana grass, sugar cane and banana trees would be nice, and the water outlet could be piped to a nearby fruit tree.

This post featured at:

(photo from Joel’s Polyface Farms web site)

(Yep, like total fanboys, Adam and I had our photo taken with Joel at the 2011 Jamberoo workshop!)

If you’re able to get to one of these workshops, do it. You won’t regret it.

And let me know if you’re going to the Sunday one in Kiama!

A trailer is an invaluable addition to a homestead. It turns the family car into a ute (pickup truck if you live outside Australia!), without the expense of buying and maintaining an additional vehicle.

This is a list of what I think are the ideal features for the ultimate homestead trailer. You probably won’t find a trailer with every feature on the list, and your needs won’t be quite the same as mine, but hopefully you’ll find this a handy starting point.

Basic Trailer Structure

A single axle (i.e. two wheels) is best here in NSW – registration costs are higher for trailers with dual axles (i.e. four wheels), and many tips charge commercial rates instead of the lower residential rates for multi-axle trailers. One axle is good for carrying loads up to 750 kg (provided the trailer is built for that!) – if you need to carry more, you may have to step up to dual axles.

I find a 1.8m x 1.2m (6′x4′) tray a little small. I went for a 2.0m x 1.5m (7′x5′) trailer – that 30% additional floor area and slightly more length have come in handy several times already.

High sides, around 50 cm (20 inches) give you a nice deep tray, great for hauling large quantities of loose materials like mulch, compost, manure, etc.

A removable cage is invaluable. My trailer’s cage height is perfect for me, at 60 cm (24 inches). On top of the 50 cm tray, that gives plenty of height for carrying animals, tying off loads, containing loose firewood, etc.

I bought the optional heavy duty weatherproof cover for the cage as well. We plan to use the trailer when we go on holidays (in fact, Megan and the kids have taken the trailer on a holiday with her Dad this week!), and there will be times when you need to move stuff in the rain without getting it wet. A cover can also be good when hauling animals, although you have to be careful they have ventilation so it doesn’t turn into a hotbox.

Ideally, the trailer should be weatherproof when the cover is on the cage. Our trailer wasn’t, as the welds around the edge weren’t continuous and water could get in through the sides. It was easy to fix with a bit of silicone, though.

If possible, get wheels, rims and stud pattern on the trailer that match the car you plan to tow with the most. This gives you more options if you get a flat while out and about. It’s good to have a spare wheel mounted on the trailer’s draw bar, too. We did specify wheels to match our car with the trailer, but unfortunately the manufacturer supplied it with low-profile tyres and rims. At least the stud patterns match.

Ideally the wheel arches should be strong enough to stand on when you’re accessing or tying down your load. It’s good to have additional step points around the trailer as well.

Tie-down rails on all four sides of the trailer make securing your load much easier. They need to be heavy duty, so you can really pull ropes tight.

The Finer Details

The tailgate should be full-width. This makes it easier to load things that are the full width of the trailer, and also much easier to clean out.

A removable tailgate is a handy feature. Mine attaches on pins and has a plug in the wire for the number plate light, making it very quick and easy to remove. It could be improved with some kind of lock on the pins – I’ve accidentally pulled it right off when opening it a couple of times now. Unlike mine, the pins should be unequal lengths so you can line them up one at a time to put the tailgate back on. It’s a bugger trying to get mine back on when you’re on the side of the road, in the dark, after accidentally pulling it off!

My tailgate hits the ground when it’s lowered, which is a bit of a hassle. It would be better if it hung freely, but I’d rather have the additional tray depth than sacrifice it for a free-hanging tailgate.

Rather than the 50 cm high tailgate and 60 cm high cage gate that I have, I wish I’d specified a longer 1.1m loading ramp for the tailgate. It would make loading and unloading much easier! I may even end up buying one in the future. Something like this (photo from Kooy Brothers):

Check that the frame of your trailer and its cage don’t have any hollow or concave areas that will collect water (e.g. a tube that’s open at the top, and welded flat to the frame at the bottom). These will collect water and debris and rust out over time.

The electricals on the trailer should generally run inside the frame, or in conduit next to the frame. There should not be wires dangling where they might get damaged by a stray stick, or pinched in a moving part.

Tailgate and cage latches should be heavy duty, secure, easily-operated, and lockable. My latches aren’t lockable, which means I need to carry chains and padlocks if I want to secure the trailer.

All screws, bolts and fittings on the trailer should be stainless steel or galvanised. Some of the screws that were used on my trailer aren’t, and they’re already beginning to rust. They’ll be easy enough to replace, but the manufacturer should have used the right ones to begin with.

The trailer should have a jockey wheel, so you can move it around by hand if need be. It also means the trailer will be level without being attached to a car, making it much easier to load. I like the style of jockey wheel my trailer came with, which can be rotated up for driving – no messing about screwing it on and off and having to store it in the car. (The actual jockey wheel is lost in the clover in this photo!)

The electrical connection on my trailer has a magnet on the back of it. What a great idea! When not in use, the plug sticks to the frame of the trailer, keeping it off the ground and out of the way.

The bolts that hold the cage on my trailer came with nuts that are up inside the folded tray edge, where you can’t get a socket or adjustable wrench around them. It was a real job to get the cage off that first time! The designer didn’t put much thought into that little detail. I replaced them with big wing nuts that catch against the tray edge, making it much easier to attach and remove the cage.

Some trailers have lights that protrude from the side or rear of the trailer, and these often get broken when reversing or maneuvering the trailer. Recessed or protected lights are a good idea.

My towing hitch can be locked with a padlock to stop anybody from being able to attach it to their car. You can also lock it onto your car, preventing anybody from removing it.

If you have any tips on choosing or modifying a trailer for the homestead, please leave them below!

In fact, it was so hot across Australia that our Bureau of Meteorology had to add new colours to their standard temperature map! The scale previously only went up to 50º C (122º F).

This is the first incidence since records began of five consecutive days above 39º C (102º F), and the heatwave isn’t over yet.

2013 is already the year with the most daily temperature records broken (6) since records began 112 years ago, and we’re only 8 days in!

As always, with the high temperature comes very high fire risk. We’ve had a really good couple of years as far as rain goes, so there has been a lot of vegetation buildup. A week of scorching heat has dried it out like kindling, so any fire that starts quickly gets out of control.

This is what the NSW fire map currently looks like:

To all the firies and others out there fighting all those fires – we’re thinking of you, and wishing you well. We’re also thinking of the people in evacuation centres, and hoping you can return home safely soon.

Closer to home, Megan had a busy afternoon trying to keep the animals cool (I’m back at work). She draped wet towels over the rabbit pens, and kept cool water up to everyone.

The nearest weather station to us (Albion Park), recorded a high of 43.1º C (110º F) yesterday. Kiama, being on the coast, recorded slightly lower at 42º C (107º F).

Despite Megan’s best efforts, we lost one of our breeding does who had just delivered a litter of 8 kits. We think she was run down from the birth and producing milk for her babies, and just couldn’t cope with the heat stress. The babies all died as well. Very sad. We won’t be breeding any does in December or January from now on, to minimise the risk of this happening again.

The dog, chickens and ducks all fared well. We’re pet-sitting some budgies for friends who are away, and thankfully they’re fine as well.

I had been clearing our roadside verge last week using my new scythe (more info to come!), and I need to finish that off ASAP. There was about 3-4 years of grass growth, with lots of dry grass underneath. If some idiot flicks a cigarette out as they drive past, it’ll quickly catch and burn up the embankment.

Thankfully it’s a lot cooler today, but temperatures will climb back to similar levels this weekend.

If you’re in Australia, how did you fare in the heat?

If you look at my thumb in the photo, you can see the egg squishing in.

Is this where rubber ducks come from?

Another blogger I follow, Christi, had a rubbery chicken egg not along ago. Check out her blog by the way, it’s awesome! Her stories of the goings-on around their farmlet are always entertaining, and I love the stick figure drawings used to illustrate them.

Rubbery eggs can be caused by low calcium (probably not our problem), stress (maybe – we’ve had a fox around, and thunder storms recently), or just weirdness (definitely plenty of that around our place!).

I also found a tiny duck egg this morning:

That’s a normal chicken egg in front of it, just for scale. I guess I’ll keep this one for next time I’m halving a recipe that requires three eggs.

Have you had any weird eggs lately?

Mostly I’ve just ended up with daytime photos of birds and night-time photos of rats. At least it showed me where to put the rat traps. I also got hundreds of photos of waving branches during the strong winds last week .

Then I came across this video on the memory card:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdhUJPwjqwY

I had put a dead Indian Myna (the best kind!) in front of the camera, hoping to lure something interesting into a photo. A couple of rats dragged it around behind the compost bay, and the next night a fox came by and took it.

Yeah, it looks a little like those “proof of the Kangaroo Valley panther” videos, but I’m pretty sure that’s just a fox sniffing around the compost bay.

I suspected a fox might have been sniffing around – I’d seen tracks in the grass, a little digging near an empty chicken tractor – but I wasn’t sure. Maybe it was just rats and stuff. It’s good to now know for sure, but the next question is “what am I supposed to do about it”?!

I’m thinking it might be worth investing in a fox trap. I’d love to hear from anyone with experience with trapping foxes. What type of trap is best? Any tips for baits, placement, etc?

The Rowe family from Blackbutt will be opening their home for tours this year. I’ve known of Scott Rowe and his massive project for a while, but I hadn’t met him in person until earlier this year when he presented at an event during the Nature Conservation Council’s Illawarra Climate Challenge.

Scott and his family set out to build a sustainable home, and have incorporated all sorts of “eco” ideas into their design. Their home harvests rainwater, processes waste water, generates electricity and hot water from the sun, maintains a comfortable temperature, and looks incredibly beautiful. And the most interesting part is that they’re doing all this right in suburbia, not out in the countryside.

Free tours commence on the hour from 10am, with the last one starting at 3pm.

Bookings are essential – contact Shellharbour Council to reserve your spot. Call 4221 6111 or email sustainability@shellharbour.nsw.gov.au.

You can read more about what the Rowes have achieved at their web site, Eco Home Shellharbour.

It’s a flower spike from a Gymea Lilly (Doryanthes excelsa), a native plant from the Sydney coastal area. We’ve got half a dozen of them in the yard, but this is the first year any of them have flowered.

The leaves of our Gymea Lillies are up to 2 metres long, and the girls like to use them to make huge woven mats for their hideouts.

Meanwhile, I’d been trying to track down a purebred Australorp rooster to breed with our 6 Australorp hens. I put a post on the Backyard Poultry noticeboard, and within a day or so someone contacted me with a rooster to sell.

It turned out the bloke selling the rooster lives just the other side of Jamberoo to me, and was actually the son of one of my father-in-law’s mates. He breeds Australorps, and had just obtained some show-quality blue Australorps from Queensland so needed to get rid of some of his older stock.

We’ve named the new guy Big Oz. He’s huge (about twice the size of the hens!), very placid, and looks after his ladies very well. He’s only about 8 months old, which is perfect for breeding from.

I’m hoping that one of our hens will go broody once the weather warms up a bit, and then I’ll set some eggs under her. I’ll be breeding and carefully selecting these chooks as a good backyard utility line. I want them to lay well (without stopping too long during winter), grow large (for meat), and be good foragers (to reduce feed costs).

The Australorp breed is already a long way down that path; I think they’re a perfect breed for homesteaders and backyarders!

What’s your favourite breed of chicken, and why?

One was an Australorp that someone gave us – they couldn’t keep him, as they lived in town. I couldn’t believe my luck: I’m gearing up to breed Australorps (we have 6 hens ready to go), and a free one drops in my lap! When I saw him, though, he had red in his feathers – so really just a cross. I had already agreed to take him, so I couldn’t back out; his owners had no other options. He did make a good rooster for the hens, looking after them while I continued looking for a pure-bred.

Besides not being what we wanted, this rooster had been getting more and more aggressive over the past few months. He attacked my daughter and wife whenever they went into the pen, and he had taken to attacking me a couple of times a week while I was doing my daily feeding rounds. In the past week, he attacked me every day! Not good.

The other three roosters were dropped off here over the past few months by various people who had hatched chicks but didn’t want to keep the boys. I’m not one to knock back a free meal .

I’m getting better at processing chickens. In the past, I’ve usually just done one at a time. If you want to get good at it, I really recommend doing a bunch in one day. You develop and hone your technique with each one, trying different things, and by the end you’re pretty good at the whole procedure.

I was also better organised this time than I have been before (I felt I needed to be, doing four at once!). I built a makeshift barbecue out of some spare bricks, put a grille over the top, and lit a fire to heat the scalding water. I used a cooking thermometer to get the water temperature just right – about 65 degrees C (about 150 degrees F) is perfect. Much better than my usual guessing.

I killed the birds one at a time, scalding and plucking one before starting the next. To scald properly, you dunk the bird for 5 seconds or so (use a stick to get them fully under, and jiggle them to get the water in under the feathers). Pull it out and test a single wing feather – if it slips out easily, scalding is complete. If not, dunk it again for a few more seconds, and test again. It can take 3 or 4 or more dunks to get it right (this is one thing I got a better feel for with each rooster).

I plucked the birds on a small portable workbench over a wheelbarrow, with a bucket of water on hand for rinsing my fingers when too many little feathers got stuck to them. Collecting the feathers like this made for a much easier cleanup afterwards!

To butcher the birds, I used my backyard sink workstation. Besides chicken processing, this is really handy for scaling and cleaning fish, and washing vegies before bringing them inside.

The basic method of butchering I use is Herrick Kimball’s How To Butcher A Chicken tutorial. That site explains it way better than I can here, and is a very straightforward and detailed tutorial to follow. I had a covered Esky full of cold water and freezer bricks on hand to put the chickens in as I completed each one.

Two of the roosters were fairly young, so I froze those ones whole for roasting. The other two were larger, but older, so I broke those down and packaged them into meal-sized portions for freezing. They’ll be tastier than the young ones, but will need long slow cooking before they’ll be tender.

I kept the offal (livers, hearts, gizzards, necks, feet) for later use. I gave the testicles to Jessie the dog (rooster testicles are inside their bodies, and are actually quite large!). The rest (heads, intestines, lungs, etc) went into the compost, as did the feathers – lots of nitrogen there. The bucket under the sink drain catches all the wash water, along with blood, stray feathers, bits of gunk, etc. I tip that onto the compost as well.

The whole exercise took me a few hours, but I spent a lot of time mucking around setting up the barbecue, cleaning down the workstation, and getting everything prepared before I actually got started. It’ll go much faster next time, now that I know exactly what I need.

We’ve now got a whole bunch of really tasty meals in the freezer, ready to go. Incidentally, supermarket chicken doesn’t taste anything like the real thing – the only chicken I’ve ever bought that was on par was one from my friends Fiona and Adam at Buena Vista Farm in Gerringong. They are just getting started growing pastured poultry, free range eggs, pork and more.

Update: Thanks to Sailors Small Farm’s recent post on their poultry processing day, I discovered these two great videos from Joel and Daniel Salatin – watch closely, and you’ll see how to eviscerate and break down a chicken about 20 times faster than I do it .

• Joel Salatin demonstrates poultry evisceration
• Daniel Salatin demonstrates cutting up a chicken

I was shopping at Aldi today, and noticed they had Tevion game cameras on sale for $129. I have a birthday coming up, so I quickly grabbed one!

I don’t have any affiliation with Aldi, but this is a really useful tool for homesteaders and gardeners at a fantastic price.

The idea is, you mount the camera on a tree or something and leave it. When an animal walks past, it triggers the motion sensor and the camera takes a photo.

This particular model has an infrared flash, so can take black-and-white photos at night without startling the animal. It can be set to either take a 5 MP photo or a 640×480 video when triggered. The case is weatherproof, so it can be left outside without worry.

One really interesting feature of this camera is that you can set it to take photos at a preset interval. I’d love to try that during some kind of construction project, so I could make a time-lapse video of its progress! Another cool use would be to photograph shadows in the yard throughout the day, to help work out what to plant where.

I can’t wait to try the camera out! Some kind of animal has been coming in the bottom of our property, near the dam, but I’m not sure what. I think it’s possibly a wombat. It’ll be great to set the camera and get a photo of it.

I’ve also seen signs of an animal scratching around the chicken pen. I don’t think it can get in, but again I’m not sure what it is and would love to find out so I know what I’m dealing with. I’m having trouble trapping some rats in the shed, too, so hopefully I can see where they hang out and where to set my traps. Oh, and I’m curious what the chooks and ducks get up to during the night .

I’d like to try to use the camera to photograph wildlife close-up as well. I should be able to get some great shots of birds.

If you have trouble with neigbourhood animals coming into your yard, this would be a great way to find out whose pet it is and get them to do something about it.

My friend Anna in the US has been using a game camera to try to see where the deer are getting into her garden, to work out where to place deterrents. She also found a time lapse camera for watching changes in the garden over time – something I’ll try once I’ve figured out all the animal issues.

What other uses can you think of for a game camera? Keep it clean and legal, please!

By my count, that makes the winner Danny (counting Kate’s two posts as one entry). Congratulations! I’ll be emailing you shortly to let you know.

Thanks to everyone who entered – there were a lot of good trees in the list. Lots of native food trees, too, which is great to see!

Did you end up going to a National Tree Day event? How was it?

I probably don’t need to tell readers of this blog about the importance of trees in our environment (and that includes where we live, not just “out in the bush”!), so I’ll keep it short and point you towards some resources to find out what’s happening near you on Tree Day. Stick your postcode in and it’ll show you the events planned in your area. There looks to be a number of things in the Wollongong/Shellharbour/Southern Highlands area.

Why have I got a picture of Lee Kernaghan? He’s one of the National Tree Day ambassadors for 2012!

Earlier this year, Planet Ark developed a report on the benefits of interaction with nature for children’s health, wellbeing and development. You can access the full report here: Planting Trees: Just What the Doctor Ordered (2.7 MB PDF).

I fully expected the report to say that spending time in nature helps children’s mental health, development, gross motor skills, etc. But I was surprised to learn that children who spend time outdoors have lower incidence of myopia (short sightedness) and have lower average BMI (body mass index) compared to children who spend most of their time indoors. There are real, measurable, health benefits to getting the kids outside.

Giveaway!

Toyota has been a sponsor of National Tree Day for more than a decade now, and to help promote it this year they’ve given me a $100 Bunnings voucher to give away to a lucky reader. That’d buy you a few nice trees. Thanks Toyota!

To be in the running for the voucher, leave a comment below telling everyone what your favourite Australian native tree is. I’ll pick the winner randomly (one entry per person) at midday on Sunday (AEST).

Apologies to overseas readers, but this contest is for people in Australia only. The voucher wouldn’t be much use to others anyway! Feel free to leave a comment still, but just let me know if you’re not in Australia.

Oh, and my favourite native tree? I’d have to say Macadamia, although I do like Illawarra Flame Trees and red flowering gums as well. Oh, and of course wattle!

A couple of weeks ago, Mrs Xuerub from Jamberoo Primary and I went along to the official opening of Mount Terry Public School’s new permaculture garden. This garden was the brainchild of teacher Stuart Hall, who was given a grant by Shellharbour Council to gain a Permaculture Design Certificate.

Stuart has certainly put his new skills to work in this garden, along with local permaculture designer Aaron Sorenson (designer of the fantastic Kiama Public School permaculture garden).

The primary feature of this garden is a water channel running the whole length of it. I think it used to be a stormwater drain along the edge of the school property that had to remain. In true permaculture style, the problem is the solution. The drain was turned into a meandering creekbed, flowing through the garden and providing passive water storage, a bit like a swale.

Safety is always a big concern when building school gardens, especially in primary schools where younger children are present. Ponds must be no deeper than 30 cm (about a foot) to prevent danger, but there was also a desire to capture rainwater and allow it to hydrate the surrounding gardens.

The solution was to build little dams or gabions across the creekbed at regular intervals along its length. These were sized so the water pool behind each one would be no more than 30 cm deep, but would hold enough water to help the surrounding plants – just like a swale. The dams also provide lots of handy spots for students to cross the creekbed without getting their shoes wet.

At the end of the creekbed, the water collects in a shallow dam or billabong. This makes for a nice little wetland area.

Along the banks of the creekbed, sweet potato and nasturtium have been planted as ground covers. This living mulch outcompetes weeds and grasses while providing an edible harvest and biomass for composting.

Bananas and bana grass have been planted along the edge of the school property to screen the fence and to give some privacy to neighbours. Both plants love the moisture provided by the creekbed. They also provide a windbreak to help protect young fruit trees, and pump out lots of biomass for mulching and composting.

I really like the signs that a parent has been making for all the fruit trees the kids have planted:

Paths in the garden have been edged by comfrey. It provides a good barrier to keep out invading grass runners, and is tough enough to stand up to the regular trampling of people use the paths. When it gets a flush of new growth, the students just cut it and drop it right there on the garden as mulch – no need to collect and carry, just chop and drop. I’d love to know how they got so much comfrey – I really need to propagate a lot this spring!

Towards the end of the creekbed, where the garden widens out, the students have built a plot for their annual vegetables. It’s fenced to keep out chickens and other animals. Even at this time of the year, they had a lot going on with cauliflowers, broccoli, tomatoes, spinach, herbs, peas, and many other varieties.

One top tip given to me by the students was to always put a banana peel in the hole before planting a tomato seedling. They reckon this nutrient boost is the secret to their highly productive tomatoes!

Dotted around the gardens are these wheelie bins (donated by Shellharbour Council). I assume they were damaged bins – the bottom has been cut off them, and they’re partially buried in the ground. They make a fantastic compost bin, with an attached lid that won’t blow away.

Mt Terry also has some poultry. I really liked this super-secure chicken tractor, made out of lengths of weldmesh fencing. It has weldmesh on the base as well, so nothing can dig under the edges. This thing would last for decades!

The main chicken pen is a fairly standard coop-and-run setup, with corrugated iron around the edges for predator protection.

As well as the chickens, they had guinea fowl in the run. The kids told me they help protect from predators by making a lot of noise whenever threatened.

In a school setting, a nice big seating circle is an excellent idea. It gives a gathering place to start and end each lesson, with plenty of room to move around, and lets all the kids see what’s going on without being stuck at the back of a group. This style of circle is a signature feature of Aaron’s school garden designs, very similar to the one at Kiama Public School.

This is a fantastic idea for allocating various tasks out to the students. Each student has a wooden clothes peg with their name on it, and the board has a list of jobs that need to be done. During the planning stage of the lesson, the pegs are placed next to the jobs so everyone knows what they’re supposed to be doing.

One of the problems Stuart encountered early on was what to do with all the kids’ gloves at the end of each lesson. If they just shoved them into a box in the store room, the damp gloves got mouldy and smelly. He found these hangers at an op shop, and attached them to a frame salvaged from a clothes store’s junk pile. Not only does it let the gloves dry properly, but it keeps the pairs together so the kids can get started on their jobs quickly.

So what happens with all the produce the students grow? They load up their vegie cart, and sell it in the school playground! The cart was built by the local Men’s Shed (a fantastic organisation that I just can’t say enough good things about!).

Does your local school have a vegie garden? Or even better, a permaculture garden? How is the garden integrated into the school’s curriculum?

I’d love to see photos if you have them! I’m after as many ideas as I can get for Jamberoo Primary’s gardens.

Overall, a little over 300 households across the Illawarra registered for the challenge. Those who earned over 35 stars in the scoring system in the Challenge booklet were dubbed “climate champions” and were eligible for prizes at the awards night.

In keeping with my run of great luck lately, I won the major prize!

I received a $300 voucher from Bike Hub, a local bicycle retailer. My eldest daughter has Down syndrome; we’re planning to put that money towards getting her a 3-wheeled bicycle so she can keep up with her sisters at the park.

All the climate champions were also given a fruit tree.

Here’s the NCC press release covering the Challenge wrap-up.

I was interviewed for ABC local radio this week, and The Illawarra Mercury picked up the story as well. I really liked the photo that ran with the story, taken by Mercury photographer Dave Tease: