WOMEN'S new&views... Holiday spent on outback Queensland station

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33739, 11 January 1975, Page 6

WOMEN'S new&views... Holiday spent on outback Queensland station

A sheep station in the Australian outback, about 1000 miles north-west of Brisbane, must rate high as an unusual venue for a relaxing break away from work especially when two of the owners of the s tation are away , and you are called <»n to help with the odd jobs that crop up on a 55 ,000-acre spread.

Lucy Silz and Russel Skerret. of Christchurch. found a few such jobs awaiting- them when they arrived for a holiday last month on i the Marengo station, owned by the Seccombe family, near Barcaldine. in Queensland.

Miss Silz and Mr Skerret had met the Seccombe brothers in South Africa several years ago. One of the problems confronting them was a 500 lb wild pig which had been killing sheep, and had to be dealt with. A water-storage tank had to have 10 years growth of moss and slime scraped off, and there were plenty of drains and windmills to check and keep in working order. Water on the station comes from artesian bores. All this had to be done in temperatures up to 49deg.C ■ in the shade, and there was not too much of that. Wildlife plentiful There were compensations of course: the water holes teamed with wildlife not seen before by Miss Silz, an American, and Mr Skerret, a New Zealander, although they had travelled extensively in Africa. Living and working on the r station for two weeks also f gave them an excellent op--3 portunity to learn about the 5 area, which is alternately > besieged by floods and 1 droughts. On Sundays, they • were rewarded for their hard i work with water ski-ing on one of their nearest neighbour’s dams, 30 miles away. The dam and the water 1 ski-ing, in spite of its incongruous setting in the middle of miles of parched red earth and sparse gum trees, provided a welcome respite from the heat and! work for many of the local r station owners and their workers. ’ Miss Silz and Mr Skerret 1 arrived at Marengo station . after an 18-hour bus ride t and a 110-mile car trip. According to Miss Silz, . the scenery for meat of the , journey was very barren, like she had seen in Botswana and Zambia, but the temperature was hotter. Bottle litter Beer bottles and cans along the road confirmed reports from other travellers to Australia’s outback that awareness of pollution has not reached the “centre” yet. One town had tried to solve its beer-bottle problem by placing a ring on a pole beside the road at the distance from the town where it was estimated a driver drinking a “stubbie” (a small bottle of beer) would

finish the bottle. He would then lob the empty bottle through the ring where it would remain with others, until someone came to collect them.

Rising at daybreak (about 5 a.m.) the first day on the station, Miss Silz and Mr Skerret were surprised to see two kangaroos grazing on the front lawn. The animals departed rapidly when people came out of the house.

A tour of the station proved to be quite a wildlife tour. Everywhere the roofless, doorless station car

went, emus, wild pigs and horses, kangaroos, and many varieties of wild birds could be seen. One of the most unusual animals was a 4ft goanna (a large lizard), which often frequented one of the drains, and became a regular feature of the tours of the station.

Pig hunt The wild pig which had been preying on the sheep was killed by two reluctant hunters, one of them Mr Skerret, after a 15-minute chase through the scrub. It was

|a rather magnificent animal, land the men did not like having to kill it. I However, the 11,000 sheep lon the station have a tough enough time contending with droughts and floods, without! II the threat from wild animals.! | A bird of prey, the wedge-i 11 tail eagle, is also a menace. It carries off young Jambs,! I often dropping them over, (telephone poles, where it eats, them. Miss Silz said the skeletons of lambs hanging from telephone poles were a strange sight. ,

Morning calk only The poles themselves could be said to be a strange sight, being so far from anywhere, and the telephone

system sutlers from the ments, too. The telephone at the stallion can be used only in the mornings, as by afternoon the |heat causes the resistance of ithe conductors to rise and the signals to weaken. This means the station is completely isolated, and the ! only way important messages can reach it is on the evenling local news bulletin on the i radio.

Family planning. — Participation in a pre-marital family-planning course has become necessary in the Philippines to obtain a mars riage licence. Special programme manuals have been developed for the course.