A word from the man himself: Michael

The fire approached from Spring Creek on Friday night and spread through Buchanan's paddock.

The CFA crews contained it until a gale force north wind dispersed spot fires through the valley.
It was not possible to establish if it was fire storm winds but large trees were uprooted and tossed aside.

The wind then changed to the south and carried the fire rapidly down the valley. I found it difficult to defend our property because of its dispersed nature but the perimeter tracks and irrigation helped substantially to protect the orchards.

We were fortunate to have Andy Ray helping Carol around the house on that Friday night. another outbreak on Sunday burnt the remainder of our hill, except for the chestnut orchard. The pity was the loss of pasture and fences and also some of my special trees which originated from the botanic gardens.

All in all we were thankful that not more of our farmed areas were destroyed. The bushland that was all burnt will recover. We look forward to different flowers coming out in the bush, possibly things that we may have never seen before.

We are already finding interesting agricultural artifacts along the creek where the blackberries have been burnt by the fire.