The Heysen Trail 10. "Too many sheep"

 

 

I was feeling a weary, bit of joy when the hill finally showed signs of levelling out. I glanced back and saw the fence disappear from view - testimony to its gradient. On top I disturbed a murder of crows feasting on a carcass. Was this the last resting place of the headless deer? To find out, I would have had to crawl over the four-foot fence. The blood I could see from 50 metres away wasn't exactly an invite. The way things were going on this trail, I could have laid down next to it and turned into crow fodder myself.




Dare I say it? Oh deer!!

 

I continued along the fence and still, probably due to exhaustion, got lost. ‘It said follow the fence, not  jump it, Mars!!!!’ Having lost any sign of the trail I had a gut-full and sat down to indulge in a cup of soup and some of my last blobs of extra deserved chunks of goats cheese. It was difficult to get to a sitting position with a knee that was stiff and full of fluid, but even more difficult to find where I went wrong on the map.

I was sitting at the end of a broad strip of sheep-dung-covered grass, pondering my next move with fences running on either side – paddocks as far as the eye could see, when I heard the sound of an engine coming near from the direction I came. A guy appeared at full speed, without a helmet, on an off-road motorbike and started working the two gates in front of me. At first he just wanted to ignore me, but I told him I had lost the track and could he please, please, please tell me where I went wrong. He pointed at a small rise in the landscape about 3km away, and said that the Heysen trail was to be found on that hill. I thanked him and told him that he had the best job ever in this amazing country side. With a cynical smile he replied, “there are just too many bloody sheep.”

Polite sheep

Having packed up, I soon understood what he meant as several hundred of the woollen bundles were herded towards me by a ute, some more guys on bikes and two working dogs. Being a city slicker, this were to be my first such experience of being swamped by sheep. It has to be said that the sheep were very polite, or were they just being cautious, and moved around me in a wide arc. I stood there like an agricultural tourist taking photographs of it all. After passing through the gate, the followers were expertly scattered in the paddock by a new dude on a bike running figure eights at full speed.

 

"You can go your own way!!!"

One of the sheep – there is always one – couldn’t keep up with the family. In my mind I was encouraging her to go faster. C'mon, you can do it!! Chop Chop!! Later on,  I spotted the grand ol' lady on the back of the ute, motionless, and laying down flat. By now she has possibly disappeared in the station's freezer. Life on a station in its full glory.
 

The sheep bee-lining me and if you look carefully the grand ol' lady struggling in front of the ute

“What a day it has been” I thought as I limped along an uninspiring dirt road. I had an accident, almost, and may still, quit this hike, nearly killed myself on a steep slope, watched a playful pod of dolphins in the surf, got stuck in the soft sand of Tunkalilla beach, saw many birds and other animals - even dead ones, clutched on to a fence and hoiked myself up into the sky, escaped the evil clutches of deer-hunting decapitators, got lost on a sheep station but life couldn’t be slapping me in any more in the face if I wanted it to.

 

This dog just stood and watched the sheep rather than chased them

 

The sun had started to set when I arrived at the Balquhidder/Waitpinga campsite. It was built on the side of a hill – ‘where is the flat ground for a tent?’ -  with a tiny shelter that my tent had great difficulty fitting under or was it supposed to go on the platform? I set up quickly when a large flock of white-tailed, black cockatoos flew over screeching their melancholic sounds under a pink sky. The sound evoking a queasy feeling of depression. ‘I concur’ I thought'.
 

The platform or the shelter?

Tomorrow I walk across the road and ask for a lift to the nearest town.

 

Grey Bits

The sheep station I was lost on for one hour was the Balquhidder station. I have to thank them for letting Heysen trail hikers traipse through their property, for showing me the way back to the trail and allowing me to take these photographs without asking for permission.




The Chicken Run

One of the great pleasures of being employed here at Fraser Range is driving the quad bike around this beautiful place. Riding solo or having your chick sitting behind you on a bike while she is clamping on is one of the joys of life. Feeling that wind blow through my semi-grey hair - it is the taste of pure freedom.




Amazing Fraser Range

Other than evoking feelings of freedom we are using the bike to do our work. Jules and I have dubbed this job here at Fraser Range station as the “chicken run”. At 8am I hook a trailer to the quad and start the "garbo" round at the kitchen where a large bin full of food scraps is collected. After visiting the horse pens to check if the overnight visiting horses and owners have left any rubbish in the bins, I cruise with the airstream through my locks to the chicken pen. As soon as the bike stops in front of the gate, 30 odd chickens scramble excitedly to the entrance. At this stage I am not allowed to let the chickens become free-range. I push my way cautiously through the "great wall of chicken" into the large enclosure, closing the door carefully behind me so as not to cause any "chicken snitzel". I throw the contents into the pen as far away as possible, but cannot help it if one or two of the excitable chickens get covered in a left-over stray strand of spaghetti. A real frenzy for all these yummy snippets occurs. It is chicken pandemonium in the coop.  Before I have time to fill the bucket with the pellets from the disconnected freezer that serves as storage box or for chickens to roost on, the hens are back on my trail ready to party some more. After emptying the pellets in these cone-shaped feeding containers I am a free man, no longer haunted by the "crazy clucking crowd" (try say that fast a few times).







A safe enclosure with a freezer box

Having never being interested in any episode of “talk to the animals”, I suddenly realise that I have been chatting gibberish to the feathered creatures all the way through. “Good morning ladies, how are we all today?  My, my aren’t we in a hurry today. Oops, so sorry. Here chooky, chooks. Oh, no, that is dirty, and leave her alone you bully”.

At around 2pm the chicken run has a second phase. Again I am required to wildly blow-dry the toupee on the bike and dodge the headless herd. This time I encourage the ladies to escape their mundane surrounds and live it up in the big world by throwing some of the pallets over the fence and  opening the two gates of the enclosure. In my mind this should be an easy task but chickens do not appear to be putting as much value in freedom as us humans. They are more likely to demonstrate against liberation. I can see the banners at the rally already - “freedom sucks” or “our cage, our home”.  

A sit down protest at the gate

If you are looking for reasons why the chicken or "Gallus Gallus Domesticus" does not roam far from the pen it is not too difficult to find. The ladies have their warm cosy sheds, a safe enclosure and plenty of spots to perch on. Most of the “chickens” in the literal meaning of the word only venture a mere five metres over to the lawn across the road. The lawn does offer an undercover area and may act as a protecting shield from falcons or the family of wedge-tail eagles spotted gliding high above the surrounding hills. Maybe those chooks are not that silly after all.





The wedgies on top of the hill

After the girls have tentatively flown the coop it is time to collect the eggs. Some days there are three dozen of these "poop and allsorts" covered chook embryos of breakfast bliss. I dutifully check all the roosting spots and gather the unhatched offspring in the empty bucket even if I have to, like a thief, gently push an overzealous chook off her treasured googies. Every day the eggs are washed by hand, dried and placed in a box ready for sale or to be used in the kitchen. They are big yellow-yoked and so fresh that they are hard to peel after boiling them, but they taste great.  Some days there are kids in the park and I invite them over with a parent to help collect the eggs, wash them and in the end see them walk off proud as punch with a dozen in their little hands.





Another happy customer (photo courtesy of  the Fraser Range Facebook page)

On one occasion, the chickens  have been seen huddling up together underneath a parked ute waiting to be run over. Why cross the road if you can birdfully die in a driveway?

This chicken is strutting across the dirt road

The last phase of the chicken run occurs at dusk. A brief walk to the pen shows that all the chickens are back inside the pen and in essence know where they belong? Their movements are slow and their “pooohks” sound  relaxed. The chickens appear to unwind and crowd together on top of the freezer box and other favourite spots to keep warm from the sharp wind. I walk out, close the gates and through the safety mesh fence wish them ”goodnight”.  Let’s hope the foxes won’t bite.

 

Night falls over Fraser Range

 

Grey Bits

 
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Julie has taken to driving the quad bike. Now I get to hold on to her. We were explained by a bikie couple that stayed at Fraser Range that a guy sitting behind a girl on a bike is called “bitching”.

 

 
 


Julie on the quad waiting to give me a ride

 

The chook compound at Fraser Range is big enough to build a three bedroom house on. When I open the small gate to the adjacent paddock there is enough room for a retirement village but don't tell the chickens. 

A dozen eggs will cost you $4.50. The chickens at this time of the year can barely put up with the demands of the grey nomads and the cook for their produce.

I am using the hand held, CB or walkie-talkie to involve the chickens in the daily running of Fraser Range. This is when all the staff and some customers will hear. “Copy chicken", the chicken answers with a "cluuuuck". Roger that!

Wikepedia states that there are more than 19 billion chickens on earth. More than any other domesticated animal.

The facebook page of Fraser Range is https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=fraser%20range%20station

100 km East of Norseman. You can't miss it