Growing enough food for a growing family

The family took action to try living off the land a year ago, moving from Bacchus Marsh to a quiet country property near Creswick.

Margaret Phelps said the change in costs to feed her family was incredible. The mother-of-five rarely buys meat any more – her family rears its own lambs and pigs to eat. They occasionally buy chicken because their chickens are for eggs.

What they do not grow, Ms Phelps tries to source locally, like potatoes from a grower in Kingston.

“We grow enough to feed our family,” Ms Phelps said. “Mostly my little one helps the most on the farm. We grew 50 pumpkins in the summer and she did all the watering...Evie's always saying ‘I want to eat my pumpkin’.”

Ms Phelps said there was a marked difference between two-year-old Evie and her teenage children in understanding and appreciating fresh food.

The Phelps are exploring a chance to sell excess produce, notably their Shiitake mushroom crops. In three-to four years’ time their hazelnut trees should also come into fruition. 

Ms Phelps said selling produce was a hard market to crack. Farmers’ markets were tough gigs and she has found a lot of supermarkets and grocers in the Ballarat region already had their suppliers.

“There really isn’t a lot of support for stocking or supporting local produce,” Ms Phelps said. “We grow so much stuff in Australia, why do we need to import fruit and veg from countries like China?”