Last month I attended a live Q&A showing of the film ‘Rehydrate Australia’ by Tarwyn Park Training. Tarwyn Park teaches Natural Sequence Farming, a regenerative land management approach based on the pinoeering work of Peter Andrews and now continued by his son Stuart and family. Peter has been restoring natural water cycles and transforming the Australian farming landscape since the 1970’s when he started putting his ideas into practice at his place, Tarwyn Park in Bylong, NSW. Peter’s book ‘Back from the Brink‘ published in 2006 lays out the thinking behind his approach and forms the basis for the training courses.

The film does a good job at blending Natural Sequence Farming philosophy with examples of on-ground work, flying us across Australia and into the farms and farmers that have either completed the training course or contracted Tarwyn Park in to help re-hydrate their land.

While the educational message of the film is clear, it’s the family dynamics that really brought this film to life for me. We don’t even make it to the five minute mark before Stuart Andrews is calling his dad ‘P.A’ and explaining how growing up under his ‘stick’ was not always easy. Move on a few more minutes and Stuart is likening his dad to an African Boxthorn – A prickly plant, pioneer and doing a job others can’t do – while he feels he’s more of a blackberry bush. Bravo for them for being so game to share those interesting and useful insights.

During the Q&A Stuarts son Hamish (from Forage Farms) spoke, answering some of the tricky questions posed by this upper Blue Mountains audience. In answering it occured to me that the prickles looked to have gotten even smaller with this generation, proof indeed that natural sequence farming works for people as well as paddocks. Bravo!

The film can be viewed for free in the comfort of your own home on the Tarwyn Park Youtube chanel or you can request a showing at your local and make a night of it with all of your friends!