From beef to bush tucker
From the ABC
By Kim Honan
Back in the early 1990's when the bottom dropped out of the beef cattle industry Bruce and Barbara Barlin decided to diversify into bush foods.
Now half the challenge is convincing consumers to go native and use the local flavours when cooking.
Bruce and Barbara run Barbushco, an organic native bush food company, from their plantation and orchard in the Lorne Valley on the New South Wales mid-north coast.
A tour round Townsville
Photos and Story by Braydon Moloney
Townsville is situated in the coastal dry tropics of northern Queensland. It is a popular tourist stop-off, with most visitors using it as a base for exploring Magnetic Island, the Great Barrier Reef or the historic inland area around Charters Towers. It is also a popular place for holidaying birdwatchers - there are a plethora of RAMSAR listed wetlands around the city, which attract migrant waterbirds from both the north and south, and its proximity to the Wet Tropics sees the occasional appearance of exotic rainforest vagrants as they hop between patches of monsoon vine thickets. But if you look past the colourful birds and begin to examine what they're sitting on, what they're eating, and what they're 'depositing', a new story beings to unfold. Welcome to the coastal dry tropics and its incredible diversity of bush food.