I try and avoid branded and plastic toys and instead favour simple toys made from natural materials like timber or bits of nature. But I’m suspecting one of Little Eco’s recent toys was taking my preference for natural a little too far. What do you think? I also highlight the devastating impact barbed wire has on Australia's wildlife. Read more →

Winter 2012 was our first season at our little farm. It was the season we started Little eco's natural playground. First we made the mud kitchen and now there's a rope swing. There's plans for more. It was the season I realised that being 'closer to nature' also means experiencing more often the heartbreaking impact that we have on her. This is a dead threatened Squirrel Glider stuck on our barbed wire fence. It happens so often that getting caught on barbed wire fences is listed as a threat to the species' survival. (more) I also experienced just how bad... Read more →

What I'm loving most about time at our little farm is that nature is easy to connect with. I struggle to find time to connect with nature when living in the city. It feels unnatural and forced. I have to set ourselves challenges like our Urban Adventure to squeeze a few moments with nature into our day. Whereas when we are at our little farm, nature is everywhere. We stumble across it, literally.... On our way to the swings early on Sunday morning Little Eco and I nearly trod on this nest of eggs. Can you see it? The eggs... Read more →

We had our first working bee at our little farm on the weekend. I invited a few colleagues along for a 'flora and fauna ID party' to start a species list for the property. After a few hours we had a list of over 100 plant species. Although I'm a plant ecologist, my plant identification skills are pretty rusty so it would have taken me weeks to get this list. I’m going to embrace working bees on our little farm. I love that working bees: provide a great excuse to hang out with friends; can make a not-very-fun task enjoyable;... Read more →

I was daydreaming recently about how cool it would be to have a compost toilet that collected urine. Wondering why I’d want to collect urine? Urine is high in nitrogen and a super good fertiliser. Apparently a family of four can produce the equivalent of a 50kg bag of NPK fertilizer from urine alone every year. But instead of collecting it we flush it down the loo, along with nutrient rich humanure, and then manufacture resource-hungry synthetic fertiliser. To make it even worse we flush those resources down the loo with up to 12 litres of clean drinking water. What... Read more →