Ktendolle Weekend big reads

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Lush feed at push of button

By Kiri ten Dolle nnn t RIGHT now more than 60% of Queensland is in severe drought. The situation is dire.

For some graziers in the north, the only humane option for their hungry malnourished herds is to shoot them.

Growing demand for Australian beef overseas coupled with the pressures of production back home has triggered increased focus for innovative sustainable crop production alternatives.

But on a small farm on the fringe of Boonah, south-west of Ipswich, an agricultural engineer has developed a ground-breaking solution to the chronic agricultural feed shortage in Queensland.

His invention eliminates the need for thousands of hectares of land to produce livestock. Frank Anvari has spent the past two years fine-tuning a fully automated crop production

With this machine there is no reliance on the climate, it’s not drought or flood affected. prototype he says is an answer to Australia’s food security problem.

The hydroponic system cultivates seed into feed in six days using merely water and a specifically designed fertiliser. And his cows can vouch for it. They are arguably the healthiest in the country.

Inside a greenhouse, barley, oat, corn, cow peas and other seeds are automatically fed into a hopper twice daily and onto a conveyor. At the end of the conveyor is a luscious, omega three-rich carpet of grass. There’s no soil and it’s produced in less than a week.

The machine shaves the fodder into bite size pieces, which are delivered by another conveyor to the cows at the other end. The single conveyor prototype at 15m long produces 200kg of food a day.

Mr Anvari says he is able to keep 30 cows on his 10ha property, instead of 10, increasing profits three-fold.

The dimensions and number of conveyor levels can be increased to feed anywhere from tens to hundreds

REVOLUTIONARY INVENTION: Mona and Frank Anvari with the automated crop machine prototype.

Mr Anvari shows how the seeds are laid on the machine. of thousands of cattle, a nutritionally rich grass diet.

“With this machine there is no reliance on the climate, it’s not drought or flood affected,” he explains.

The benefits are plentiful and the result is increased meat quality “There is no reliance on the weather, no pests, very little labour cost, little amount of energy and water use and it can be hooked up to solar power,” he says.

“This machine will dramatically reduce costs and help Australian growers.”

The 71-year-old’s passion for agriculture and engineering stemmed from the 1970s when he established

The feed is cut and dropped onto a conveyor belt.

a pistachio farm in Victoria. By the mid-1980s Mr Anvari was one of the first in Australia to grow seedless watermelons from his farm at Gympie.

“When I was a child I grew up on a large farm and my father used traditional methods that were sustainable and produced incredible amounts of crop without the use of chemicals or synthetic fertilisers,” he says.

“I have always found agriculture and machinery interesting and coming to Australia have always enjoyed researching and studying mechanical engineering and microbiology.”

In the late 1980s he founded the

PHOTO: ROB WILLIAMS

Cows enjoy the nutritious grass at the end of the process.

international fertiliser company Grow Green, based at Kalbar. He sold the business and retired in 2011, but the formulation he invented continues to be used across America, the Middle East, India and Europe.

Mr Anvari is working on a commercial model of the Anvari Machine.

“Nothing goes to waste. The cows are very happy. They get a balanced meal high in protein content, carbohydrates, omega three fatty acids and the full spectrum of vitamins and minerals,” he says.

“At the moment we’re using 45 litres of water and 25kW of power per day to produce 200kg of food. Now, compare that to a typical irrigator

which uses 10,000 litres of water per hectare. Then there is fertiliser. For every hectare of land, many farmers are using up to 500kg of urea, 250kg potassium and phosphorus, and 100kg trace mineral per year.

“So much is wasted through leaching and nutrients being locked up and made unavailable in the soil.

This machine uses 300 to 400ml of a natural fertiliser each day, which equates to about 150 litres a year.

“For irrigated land, herbicide and insecticides are often used, but there is no harmful chemicals used in this machine. And when it’s a good year, the farmer can create an abundance of valuable hay storage for winter months.”

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Major award for Boonah geologist nnn t KIRI TEN DOLLE REPORTS

Boonah artist and geologist John Jackson won a prestigious Reg Sprigg Medal for outstanding service to the petroleum industry.

PHOTO: DAVID NIELSEN

John Jackson’s art really rocks J

OHN Jackson can pick up a rock and tell you about the environment that once existed, the volcanoes, lakes or oceans and the animals that previously roamed.

The Boonah geologist-turnedartist, known only as The Rock Doctor, uses his paintings to tell stories of what lies beneath the earth’s surface.

“If you look at the flat country between Boonah and Ipswich, this was once a big giant lake and we had dinosaurs running around,” the 69-year-old explained.

“They’ve found dinosaur footprints in Ipswich.

“And if you look at the magnetic pieces in the rock, we were actually on the South Pole when this was happening and there was no ice. You get this by reading the stories of the rocks.”

Mr Jackson was last week awarded the Australian Petroleum Production and Exploration Association’s highest honour: the

prestigious Reg Sprigg Medal for outstanding service to the industry.

Described as the Renaissance Man, Mr Jackson was credited for the legacy he has left on the Australian oil and gas industry and his unique combination of geology, art and education.

“It’s absolutely the highest point of my career,” he said.

“I can’t even imagine going higher that that. I actually thought everyone had forgotten about me.”

Mr Jackson, under Alan Bond’s Bond Petroleum, built the first Australian offshore oil field in the world in Western Australia in 1986.

“To this day all the infrastructure is still used,” he said.

“It used to be 10% of Western Australia’s liquid gas production and continues to provide gas to Kalgoorlie, to Perth.”

Among a long list of international projects, Mr Jackson found his calling in South Africa while working under Nelson Mandela.

“I managed to get about five gas fields onboard for South Africa and get them into a cash flow position,

which made up 10% of South African liquid petroleum production,” Mr Jackson recalled.

“We kept the planes flying and the trucks driving.”

Leading a multicultural team, he found he was hitting a rock wall when it came to communicating with the dozens of nationalities. He pulled out a bed sheet one day and drew what they were trying to achieve.

Mr Jackson’s visual descriptions gelled and when he took over managing a drilling campaign in Uganda in 2002, he painted the proposal on a six metre long piece of calico.

Each morning he would roll out the canvas, just like his father had shown him throw the sheep fleece when he was a boy, and explained what they would be drilling that day.

“I was in an area where no one knew anything about oil or gas at all,” Mr Jackson said.

“They new how to chop a tree down, start a fire and boil some water but that was about it. I couldn’t communicate with them and it worked.”

Mr Jackson graduated with a PhD in geology and science in 1970 at University of New England in Armidale.

On his first day of uni, he was wideeyed to the career path he wanted to take.

“I went to uni to do physics, chemistry and maths. I couldn’t do botany because it clashed with rugby training,” he said. “I rang up my dad and said what else can I study? He said, well, your bedroom is full of rocks. How about geology?”

Mr Jackson collected rocks ever since he could reOrigins of the Fourth Dimension depicts the evolution of the prehistoric jawless fish. member.

PHOTO: DAVID NIELSEN

I’d love to turn the education system on its head so that you learn geology from the age of five when you first hit school “It’s always been about the stories of rocks for me,” he said.

“I get very passionate about rocks themselves because, as a human race, we protect the whales, the koalas, plants – we go nuts about them.

“But nobody does anything about rocks.”

Now living in the Scenic Rim, Mr Jackson still consults for international oil companies but spends most of his time painting geological cross sections of the world beneath: a genre he calls GeoArt. “From the Scenic Rim right down to Mt Warning, which is otherwise called the green cauldron, is a set of mountains that formed when Australia bumped into Asia,” he explains.

“So it is actually a monument of when Australia ran into Asia. What a wonderful tourism attraction that is.”

Fascinated by the geological landforms around him, he takes local school students on tours, tells geo stories and introduces them to the science behind rocks.

“Just about everybody picks up a pebble before they go to school and usually they get into trouble because they’ve thrown through a window or they’ve left it in their pocket and it’s gone into the washing machine,” Mr Jackson said.

“One way or another, rocks get a bad name before you even go to school.

Beneath the Bridge portrays an exploded view of what lies beneath Sydney Harbour.

PHOTO: CONTRIBUTED

“I’d love to turn the education system on its head so that you learn geology from the age of five when you first hit school, so kids are taught how to read a rock just like you teach kids how to read a book.

“That way people get a holistic view of the earth.”

He said each rock had a personality.

“Some are stressed, some are angry, some are happy.

“I love picking up rocks from the side of the road.

“They are like orphans, migrants, terrorists.

“You never know where they are from.

“It’s like a lucky dip sometimes.

“I pick up a rock and go holy smokes where did that come from?

Combined with art, he said: “It puts me in a different world.”

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SURVIVING THE

Titanic Turn to Page 23

Saturday, January 26, 2013

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Family with a real link to the 1912 sinking of the Titanic Local’s grandmother survived the liner’s sinking, writes KIRI TEN DOLLE nnn t

EPIC EXPERIENCE: Mrs Haisman was 15 when her family boarded RMS Titanic in 1912 in Southampton, England.

I

T comes up at the dinner table from time to time, but most people close to Dawn Pincott don’t know her grandmother survived the Titanic.

The Camira mother of two was the granddaughter of one of the oldest living survivors of the Titanic – Edith Haisman (nee Brown).

Mrs Haisman was 15 when her family boarded RMS Titanic in 1912 in Southampton, England.

Her father was taking her and her mother to New York to open a hotel business. Everything they owned, tableware, furnishings and 1000 rolls of bed linen for the new venture was packed into the Titanic’s hold.

Mrs Pincott said the night Titanic struck an iceberg on April 14, 1912, haunted her grandmother for the rest of her life.

“She remembered the screams and the noises of the ship falling apart,” Mrs Pincott said.

“Once the ship sank, there was no sound and the ocean looked like glass.

“She had nightmares for years.”

In a series of interviews throughout her lifetime, Mrs Haisman gave vivid accounts of what happened during

She remembered the screams, the noises of the ship falling apart. Once it sank, there was no sound, the ocean looked like glass Titanic’s final moments. She said her father woke her and her mother, telling them to put on their life jackets and something warm.

On deck, a steward had told them the ship had struck an iceberg, but said it was nothing to worry about.

Mrs Haisman remembered the band playing ragtime music to keep spirits high, while passengers said she’s unsinkable, she won’t go down.

“No one panicked, they just got up to see what was going on,” Mrs Pincott said. “People were still dancing, the band was playing.

“There was ice coming onto the

HISTORIC LINK: Dawn Pincott of Camira, who is the granddaughter of one of the longest living survivors of the Titanic, with PHOTO: DAVID NIELSEN Tiffany (centre), 12, and Laura, 17. deck from the iceberg. People weren’t worried, they were picking it up and putting it in there drinks.”

Mrs Haisman’s father kissed her and her mother as they boarded Lifeboat 14. She never saw her father again.

“It was women and children first and she said to her father: ‘Come with us” and he told them: ‘No I will see you in New York’,” Mrs Pincott said.

“They were buying a restaurant in New York. They were very wealthy.

They had all their belongings on the ship, but nothing was insured.”

Mrs Haisman’s last memory of her father was of him smoking a cigar and sipping brandy as they were lowered into the lifeboat.

“It was very cold and the lifeboat leaked,” Mrs Pincott said. “She could hear screaming and there were dead bodies everywhere, like in the movie.

“Once I watched the movie it became more real to me.”

Mrs Haisman later migrated to Australia to live with her 10 children.

After a few years in Queensland she moved back to Southampton.

In 1993, Mrs Haisman received a gold watch, thought to be her father’s, which had been discovered during a diving expedition on the Titanic wreck.

Three years later, at 99 years of age, she travelled on a cruise ship to the location of the disaster and laid a rose in the Atlantic Ocean where Mrs Haisman last saw her father. Mrs

Haisman died in 1997, aged 100.

“Even to this day, I still see my grandmother on TV talking about Titanic,” Mrs Pincott said. “I’ve always wondered why there was such a big interest in the Titanic – there’s been lots of disasters over the years but this one seems to have stuck.”

A piece of the Titanic wreck now sits tucked away in the Pincott home, a reminder of the family’s secret.

David Haisman, Mrs Pincott’s uncle, last year produced a book about Edith Haisman’s story.

“When I was in hospital last year, the anniversary of the Titanic’s sinking, I saw her on TV,” Mrs Pincott said. “The nurse was talking me and I was telling her: ‘Shush, that’s my grandmother’.”

Saturday, January 26, 2013

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BIG READ

HELLO MUM: Ipswich Koala Protection Society vice president Marilyn Spletter of Hatton Vale with koalas Webcke (left) and Halo.

Koalas gets second chance

PHOTO: DAVID NIELSEN

Marilyn Spletter gets great pleasure releasing koalas back into the wild, writes KIRI TEN DOLLE

M

ARILYN Spletter has saved the lives of more than 70 orphaned koalas.

The 66-year-old has been a volunteer wildlife rescuer with the Moggill Koala Hospital and Ipswich Koala Protection Society for 22 years.

Each year more than 180 sick, injured and orphaned koalas are rescued by the small team of dedicated carers, who travel some 20,000km to save their lives.

The mammals have become a huge part of Mrs Spletter’s life that she even built her Hatton Vale home around a purpose-built koala room.

She is currently caring for 14month-old Webcke and 11-month-old Haylo. She calls them her babies and they think she is mum.

Little Webcke was rescued from Mutdapilly in December. Weighing only one kilogram, he had perforated lungs after falling out of a tree.

“He had a 50-50 chance of surviving,” Mrs Spletter says, as she bottle feeds him in her arms. “We think mum might have dropped him out of the tree, which can damage the lungs.

“When we get people ring up saying they’ve got a baby koala in their backyard, we always ask if it is bigger or smaller than a football. If it’s smaller than a football we know it’s a baby and it needs our help” That’s how Webcke got his name.

Six months since he was rescued, Webcke is healthy at 2.25kg and is almost ready to go back into the wild.

“This is his only bottle and only cuddle,” the grandmother of nine says.

“He’s got to learn to have no contact, so by the time he is off his bottle he’s

nnn t

PAMPERED BABY: Marilyn Spletter with Webcke. not having any cuddles either.”

Mrs Spletter and husband Max are preparing to send him to Kindy at Moggill Koala Hospital, where he will learn to fend for himself without human contact and live independently.

The kindergarteners are monitored weekly and graded by the strength of a muscle between their shoulder blades before they go back into the wild.

“Sometimes they can be in there for up to six to eight weeks,” Mrs Spletter says.

All koalas are microchipped and are release back within a 4km of where they were found. Seeing them go back into the wild is what Mrs Spletter says she loves most.

“People say to me, how can you hand raise them and then let them go?

But when I see them in their room, I think they should be out in a tree somewhere,” she says with a tear.

“When you release them there is so much joy. That’s what we do it for.

“It is hard to let them go ... they think I am mum, but when they go to kindy I see them once a week.”

Mrs Spletter first volunteered at Moggill Koala Hospital in 1989, when her youngest child finished school.

“When I walked in it was like I had been waiting for this all my life, this is who I am,” she says.

“I had given up smoking and would walk 8km each morning.

“I was finding possums on the road with babies in their pouch.

“It was after the third time I brought a baby to the hospital that I ended up caring for them myself.”

Now she is the possum supervisor for their group. In between juggling koalas and possums, Mrs Spletter also cares for baby gliders.

“There have been times I’ve had four

koalas and five possums at once,” she says. “Now that I only have two koalas, I find myself sitting there at night going what should I be doing?”

But caring for koalas is a full-time job, especially when it comes to fetching eucalyptus leaves for them to feed on.

The Spletters travel half an hour to cut leaf for Webcke and Haylo, every three days.

“Once it is a bit old they won’t look at it,” Mrs Spletter says. “You need about 50 trees to cut leaf for two Koalas, but it is all worth it at the end of the day.”

According to the Koala Protection Society, Ipswich is home to the largest healthy population of koalas in SouthEast Queensland, with a density higher than the Koala Coast, Redlands and Logan.

“We probably do have the same numbers if you went and did a koala count, but a lot of them would be diseased with chlamydia,” Mrs Spletter says.

The majority of this population is at Rosewood, Mount Forbes, Ebenezer and Amberley.

“We have come to realise over the years that it is not enough to rescue and rehabilitate sick, injured and orphaned wildlife,” Mrs Spletter says.

She says the Ipswich Koala Protection Society’s greatest achievement to date has been influencing the realignment of the 12km Southern Freight Rail Corridor, originally proposed to cut a swathe through the centre of significant koala habitat at Mt Forbes.

“If they have nothing to go back to our efforts are pointless,” Mrs Spletter says.

GROUP’S AIM IS TO SAVE WILDLIFE THE Ipswich Koala Protection Society, originally known as the Woogaroo Koala Protection Society, was formed in October 1994 by wildlife ranger Ric Nattrass and concerned residents in Camira.

Their aim was to protect native wildlife and habitat along the Woogaroo Creek and its catchment areas.

Trading on the popularity of the koala by calling themselves a koala group, president Ruth Lewis said the team of 300 members rescue thousands of animals each year.

The Ipswich Koala Protection Society will hold a koala information day at the Rescue and Rehabilitation Clinic at Mt Forbes on the August 11.

If you see sick, injured or orphaned koalas and other wildlife phone 5464 6274 or 3282 5035.

Saturday, April 13, 2013

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Any event, town crier brightens up the day

By Kiri ten Dolle nnn t WHILE open-heart surgery may have threatened John Deeks’ longstanding role as Scenic Rim town crier earlier this year, the 81-year-old has vowed to ring his bell for as long as he can yell “oyez, oyez!”.

The long-standing, self-proclaimed loud mouth, who holds the record for loudest town cry at 106.8 decibels, was this week recognised at a special presentation for his 18 years’ service to the region.

Mr Deeks flagged his desire to find a successor for his role and, in April, the Scenic Rim Council advertised for a replacement, which later proved unsuccessful.

Recovering from a major operation in August involving a valve replacement in his heart, Mr Deeks said he had now been given a new lease on life and would continue to serve as the Scenic Rim’s first and only town crier.

He nominated himself for the position in 1995 for Boonah Shire Council. Following the council amalgamation in 2008, Mr Deeks carried on the tradition as town crier of the Scenic Rim. On Tuesday Mayor John Brent announced Mr Deeks as the Emeritus Town Crier of the region.

“I don’t think it was ever going to be the case that John would simply hang up the bell and scroll as he has a wealth of experience to share with those interested in this art form,” Cr Brent said.

“In addition to adding attention and energy to countless numbers of community events, he has performed a great role in helping preserve an

I’m a natural loud mouth. I’d done a lot of amateur acting, which involved presentation and vocal projection, so it just came naturally. important tradition of towns and villages.”

A retired federal police officer, Mr Deeks moved to Boonah with his wife Angie in 1993 and was encouraged by friend and former Ipswich Mall manager Gerry Adamson, who was influential in bringing the Ancient and Honourable Guild of Town Criers to Australia, to take up the art of town crying in Boonah.

“I’m a natural loud mouth. I’d done a lot of amateur acting, which involved presentation and vocal projection, so it just came naturally,” he said.

“It was the first I knew about town crying.”

The tradition dates back to medieval England during the 18th century when town criers were the chief means of communication with residents, who were largely illiterate, and before newspapers were invented.

Mr Deeks plays an integral role in

PHOTO: DAVID NIELSEN

CEREMONIAL ROLE: Scenic Rim town crier John Deeks holds the record for loudest town cry at 106.8 decibels. the community, from welcoming delegates to the community, leading the Boonah Show grand parade each year to being the master of ceremonies at weddings.

He said one of the most enjoyable parts of the job had been introducing Boonah High School’s graduating students during their formal parade down the main street each year in front of more than 3000 spectators.

“Over the years I’ve welcomed the former Queensland Governor Leneen Forde to Boonah,” he said.

“I’ve welcomed Chinese delegations – that was a funny one.

They didn’t know who this fellow was, dressed up. There was a bit of

explaining to do because they’d never seen anything like it before.”

Mr Deeks said his job description was rather broad.

“The use of a town crier is all up in your head,” he said. “If you think of a function the town crier could brighten up, then we can do it.”

The only restrictions were in the dress code.

“You can’t have velcro or laces in your shoes,” he explains.

“I spent a year in Cyprus working for the United Nations Peace Keeping Force in 1986. While I was there I had a pair of leather shoes made for $60. They’re like slippers – I still wear them with my costume.”

His tricorne hat was made by a local milliner and his traditional red and gold robe by local dressmaker Kathy Bensted.

“It’s the only clothes people know me in,” Mr Deeks laughed.

“Every year the guild holds an event called the Champions of Champions and, my very first year, I came third in Australia,” he says.

For the great-grandfather of 16, keeping the folklore alive was a labour of love.

“My surgeon who replaced the valve in my heart said it would last me 15 years, taking me to 96. I’ll continue to be town crier for as long as I can,” Mr Deeks said.

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Saturday, July 13, 2013

Queens Park, a crown jewel

By Kiri ten Dolle

O

NE of Ipswich’s earliest historical chapters is Queens Park.

This month marks the 150th anniversary since the park, named in honour of Queen Victoria, was defined, declared, fenced and gated by the then Ipswich Town Council, in 1863.

It originally covered 11 hectares of prime land on high ground on the fringes of Ipswich town.

Surveyor Henry Wade set aside 80 acres of land in 1842 to be used for recreational purposes.

The park was controlled by a small group of trustees who were appointed by the Queensland Government – John Panton, George Thorn, Patrick O’Sullivan, Frederick Forbes, Christopher Gorry, Dr Henry Challinor, Arthur Macallister and Henry Kilner.

The Ipswich Council believed it inappropriate for public land to be governed by private persons, so on April 30, 1894, control of Queens Park was transferred to the council.

Given its size and the presence of native flora, the upkeep of the park was important. Alexander Munro was appointed the first curator on March 1, 1896. He built the first glasshouse and planted the majority of the large trees still in the park.

From 1864 to 1870, Queens Park became home to 30 camphor laurel trees, 29 date palms, two bottle trees, two tallow nut trees, eight bunyas, one english chestnut and 354 other native trees and shrubs.

The Ipswich Girls’ School land, which was formerly part of Queens Park, was transferred from the council to the government on June 30, 1890. The school was granted a peppercorn lease on the land.

Sporting clubs followed. The croquet club was given ground in 1902, the Ipswich Bowls Club was founded in 1906, with clubhouse in 1915, and the Ipswich Junior Tennis club was built in 1934.

Ipswich mayor Paul Pisasale says Queens Park is one of the city’s premier parks and each week attracts thousands of visitors.

“It is not just a much-loved part of Ipswich, it is also an important part of Queensland,” he said.

“Queens Park was the first park to be developed in Queensland, first being surveyed in 1842.

“In the years since, the park has undergone many changes and has become one of the most well recognised and popular venues frequented by families living in south-east Queensland.

“The original Queens Park land is now home to schools, community facilities, sporting clubs and fields, federal, state and local government facilities and two separate recreation spaces – Queens Park and Limestone Park.”

The council holds the Milford St site in trust for the Queensland Government and it is registered on the Queensland State Heritage Places Register.

The present day Queens Park was gazetted in 1982 and contains more than 22.97ha, occupying three land parcels.

Features of Queens Park are numerous, and include extensive formalised garden beds, the Japanese-style Nerima Gardens, the Ipswich Nature Centre, children’s play facilities, the Bush House, the Bush Chapel, several sporting clubs, a cafe and the Environmental Education Centre.

The Queen Mother with Ipswich mayor James Finimore at Queens Park, February 19, 1958.

RIGHT: Children playing on a bullock wagon at Queens Park, 1966.

BELOW: Queens Park entrance gates.

PHOTO: WHITEHEAD STUDIOS

PHOTO: FILE

Saturday, July 13, 2013