HEART OF THE MALLEE
The project Heart of the Mallee started as a four-part documentary series and ended up with the study of wildlife in rural areas and its ecological adaptations to the livestock farming environment.
Australia is known for the largest farming properties in the world. Vast spans of land are dedicated to sheep and cattle farming. Consequently, farming practices determine the health of biodiversity within the majority of the Australian mainland. Like any grazing country, Australia suffered from intense land clearing to open up pastures for livestock, and the unique biodiversity drastically declined as a result.
It is now proven that intense land clearing is injurious not only to the biodiversity but to the livestock production itself. Exposed to the harsh weather elements, the livestock requires more energy intake to cope, drinks larger amounts of water, which is dangerous in the land of droughts, and lowers the pregnancies and the survival of the offspring.
Biodiversity gets largely wiped out by land clearing, resulting in barren, scorching plains that hold almost no life.
Nevertheless, many farmers are aware of the huge benefits sustainability holds in farming and at times not only retain substantial amounts of bushland but also care for conservation and wildlife.
And the Heart of the Mallee project followed one of these properties.
BEHIND THE SCENES...
John Ryan lived and worked on a rural property in South Australia as a station hand. Being a conservationist and zoologist by trade, John used his free time to follow the lives of the surrounding wildlife.
Tracking, observing, recording, camera trapping and filming the animals around their farm became a part of his everyday life.
From the pair of majestic Wedge-tailed eagles, three resident emus, countless families of kangaroos and wallabies, an array of songsters to a neighbouring brown snake, the footage collection of many different species soon became to tell the story of a small South Australian sheep and cattle farm, the picturesque landscape and the incredible wildlife within.
John then started writing a documentary script, included some cattle mustering and other farm work and the footage from the camera trapping of his malleefowl and biodiversity research.
Being John's personal project, this documentary series was filmed, edited and narrated by John alone. The Heart of the Mallee features 3 approximately 35-minute episodes through the South Australian Spring, Summer and Autumn and 1 winter special.
'The idea came to me when I grew rather tired of the stereotypical portrayal of Australia in documentaries. It's either the centralian deserts or the lush northern rainforests. Although magnificent places, no doubt, there's much more to our Great Southern land than that.'' says John.
WHAT IS MALLEE?
Mallee is a type of certain species of eucalyptus that grows several stems from one lignotuber. These are rather short shrubs reaching a height of no more than 10 feet.
This very distinct habitat supports a unique composition of species that adapted to this dry sclerophyll, often dense scrub lifestyle.
The mallee term itself comes from the Wemba Wemba language, an Aboriginal language of southern New South Wales and Victoria.
WILDLIFE
Heart of the Mallee features many different species and breeds of animals.
4 types of farm animals and 6 species of feral or introduced animals.
The native wildlife is represented by approximately 3 species of instects and athropods, 5 species of reptiles, 6 species of mammals and over 30 species of native birds.
Also, the thylacine makes a ghostly appearance.
The Heart of the Mallee documentary series is currently under editing process, and it will air on our media platforms in the near future.
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