Plus honest bread and dinosaur surprise. Welcome to Galah Weekly, our award-winning newsletter keeping you up to date with regional headlines that matter, plus other delightful things from life beyond the city. By Dean Southwell, who loves his eggs.
Egg shortages could continue for up to three years as the industry deals with bird flu outbreaks that have already seen 10% of the national laying flock destroyed.
That’s the result of last year’s outbreak and a relatively new disease cluster in north-eastern Victoria.
Poultry farmer Brad McAuliffe said 540,000 birds had to be euthanised on his free-range farm at Meredith, west of Melbourne, one of seven farms in the region affected by the outbreak. He said the financial cost of losing the birds and potential production ran into the tens of millions.
There have been widespread egg shortages in some states for months. Supermarket egg prices have continued to rise and Coles, Woolworths and IGA have imposed buying limits.
Economist Matt Dalgleish said the industry had been facing a 2025 shortage even without bird flu. He said rising living costs meant many consumers had turned to eggs as a more affordable form of protein, putting pressure on supply.
For those who wonder why there’s no similar shortage of chicken meat, the US experience shows that the faster growth rate of the type of birds bred for meat production means depleted stocks can be replaced faster. Their shorter life cycle also means there’s less time for them to be infected by bird flu.
The NSW Biodiversity Conservation Trust supports producers to protect native vegetation on their land. One such landholder is Lisa McCann, who works on her 1200-hectare property in the central west to provide habitat for endangered species such as glossy black cockatoos. McCann runs cattle alongside conservation in a regenerative, sustainable approach to farming. Read her story and phone 1300 992 688 to get involved. Read more
A Mornington Peninsula baker who has sold sourdough loaves in an honesty system for the past three years has been shut down by bureaucracy and anonymous complaints about traffic.
Twice a week for the past three years Michelle Ball had stacked loaves into an antique Ukrainian street kiosk outside her Mount Martha home. Known as the Bread Box Baker, Ball’s customers had been able to turn up to the unstaffed stall, leave their $8 – and often letters and gifts as well – and take a loaf.
She has been told by Mornington Peninsula Shire, apparently alerted by the complaints about increased traffic, that she can’t continue the existing operation, angering many of her customers. Mayor Anthony Marsh said the council had an obligation to investigate when it had received the complaints and had to ensure compliance with the planning scheme as well as fairness for anyone affected.
Ball told Galah this week the Bread Box Baker was a sideline to her main baking business based at Mornington, and it allowed her to indulge her passion for work she enjoyed.
Ball said she was determined not “to get my knickers in a twist” over it and has more recently been selling her bread from the stairwell of a friendly business, although that requires her on-site and is unlikely to continue for long.
She’s obviously not the first small operator stymied by regulations. It was hard not to be reminded of the bureaucracy that regional Victorian restaurateur Annie Smithers and her wife Susan Thompson faced in a battle to be able to water a kitchen garden. Thompson said this week she was waiting to hear back on a licence application.
John Glover Art Prize winner Aisha Sherman-Noth is reconsidering her career options and looking for a bigger studio after winning the $80,000 award for landscape painting last week.
Sherman-Noth, 24, graduated from the University of Tasmania with a fine arts-science degree last year. Her winning work, Weeping birches in the avenue, was inspired by the view of a notoriously busy Hobart highway from her tiny studio.
Sherman-Noth said she’ll continue painting, but had intended to further her science studies next year. This week she said a return to study might now be delayed, but she would definitely look for a larger studio than the room she has used in her share house.
WA-based artist Lauren Elise Kennedy won the Hangers’ Choice Award for Shifting waters. People’s Choice and Children’s Choice awards are announced today.
Far north Qld residents have been warned to take precautions against the deadly soil-borne disease melioidosis, which has caused at least 16 deaths in this year’s wet season.
The disease can spread when bacteria from contaminated soil or water comes into direct contact with an open wound or if it’s inhaled or ingested.
It’s present in tropical areas such as Cairns and Townsville, especially after heavy rain. In a state hammered by cyclones and wet weather, authorities hope drier conditions will help slow the problem. Residents have been advised to wear shoes and cover up any cuts or grazes while working outside.
As if Qld hasn’t suffered enough, it has had its first detection of the devastating varroa mite in beehives.
It apparently takes a special kind of scientist to know how to grow a pumpkin big enough to row down the Tumut River at the foot of the Snowy Mountains.
Tumut horticultural scientist Mark Peacock is just the man, growing 400kg-plus whoppers to win awards at the Tumut Show, which celebrated its 150th anniversary a fortnight ago.
Peacock’s friend, Adam Farquharson, used the hollowed-out gourd to paddle down the Tumut River.
The giant pumpkins have been added to Peacock’s gardening repertoire in the past few years – he’s previously held a Guinness World Record title for hottest chilli.
"If you are going to do something you may as well overdo it," Peacock said.
Twenty-one plants and animals, including a turtle, crayfish and the Australian humpback dolphin, have been added to the nation’s threatened species list.
The government list now officially recognises more than 2000 species are under threat in Australia, which has the world’s worst extinction record.
Yet there is some good news for a bird on the list. About 30 captive-bred orange-bellied parrots were released into the wild in south-west Tasmania last week. Wildlife experts hope about 200 of the critically endangered birds will migrate north this year, the largest winter migration since conservation efforts started 30 years ago.
The King Island Dairy brand and about 60 jobs have been saved.
Canadian dairy giant Saputo, which had announced in September that it would close the factory after failing to find a buyer, has sold the business to a company led by two Victorian businessmen.
King Island Dairy is the largest employer on the island and closure would have been economically devastating for the small community.
Michelle Ball, of the Bread Box Baker, can’t be the only person using an honesty system to sell bread. If you know of other entrepreneurs around the nation using a similar system to sell bread, let us know and we’ll try to compile a definitive list.
Speaking of definitive lists, we still want to hear your weird and wonderful snake stories. After last week’s Galah Weekly snake special, we had planned to give the reptiles a break this week until stumbling on this answer to a question even we never thought to ask. Yes, a snake might even eat your bra.
Voting is now open for the People’s Choice winner of our 2025 Galah Regional Photography Prize.
Please click here to see all 42 finalists and vote for your favourite(s).
The People’s Choice winner receives $2000 and is announced at our big party in Armidale on Friday 2 May. Can you come?
Every vote is a concrete show of support for our talented regional photographers, so please share this far and wide with your network so we can all have our say and share the love.
Artist Emma Pfeiffer returns to regional NSW in a new exhibition in Walcha. Many of Pfeiffer’s works have a seaside theme and the exhibition includes ceramics. At Walcha Regional Gallery, NSW, until 2 April. Read more
Canberra bird photographer and Galah contributor Olivia Congdon leads a weekend workshop designed for beginners, hosted on the property of Ian Congdon and Courtney Young from Woodstock Flour. It includes dawn and dusk birdwatching walks and breakfast and lunch from local producers. You’ll need at least your own camera and long lens. At Woodstock Flour, Lilliput, Vic, 29-30 March. Read more
SA artist Gabriella Bisetto has won the $20,000 Tom Malone Glass Art Prize. Griffith-born Bisetto’s winning work, This Skin I’m 2#, and other finalists feature in a WA exhibition. At Linton and Kay Galleries, Cottesloe, until 30 March. Read more
More than 2500 First Nations spears are displayed at the National Gallery of Australia as part of Kulata Tjuta: Tirkilpa. It’s part of a cultural maintenance project launched in 2010 that shares the skills of making the punu kulata (wooden spear) in SA’s remote north-west. At the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra, until 29 March. Read more
Interview: Emma Hearnes
Award-winning photographer Claire Takacs has spent the past two decades capturing the world’s most impressive gardens and landscapes — enough to fill five books. Her images use light to reveal the beauty of what she calls “living works of art”.
Where do you live and work?
I haven’t had a permanent base for nearly 20 years. Instead, I have followed the seasons, working internationally.
Do you remember the first garden you photographed?
Very distinctly – it was Cloudehill by Jeremy Francis in Olinda, Victoria. It was part of a project during my photography course. That first morning, photographing at sunrise, felt like pure magic, and I was so inspired by its beauty that I’ve never looked back.
What makes gardens such a compelling subject for you?
Gardens are a very intimate and creative way to connect with nature and nurture this and ourselves. Gardens at their best can feel like a whole world, with a strong sense of place unique to the owner and environment.
Do you have a green thumb yourself?
Yes, I did own a home for a few years and had a garden and got completely carried away, gardening well into the dark and rain, loading up my car each weekend with new plants. I’m looking forward to having my own garden again one day.
What’s your favourite time of day to shoot, and why?
Mornings. Things are calm, quiet and magical. Also, it’s most often when you get the most beautiful, soft or sometimes dramatic light and occasionally mist, which I love, as it makes everything feel surreal.
BTW: Takacs is a regular Galah contributor. Among her commissions, she photographed the garden of our “In the Weeds” newsletter writer, Jeremy Valentine, in Galah Issue 6.
A boulder that sat outside the school in the central Qld town of Biloela for 20 years has been found to have one of the highest concentrations of fossilised dinosaur prints in Australia.
More than 60 three-toed footprints from Anomoepus scambus, a small plant-eater that moved on two legs about 200 million years ago, were found on the one-metre slab.
The boulder was found at the nearby Callide Mine in 2002 and given to the school by geologist Wes Nichols, whose wife was a teacher. A similar rock with fossilised prints was found lining a car park at the mine.
We’d love to hear about the news, events and people that should be making the headlines in the Galah Weekly newsletter. Share what’s new(s) in your neck of the woods with us at newsie@galahpress.com
