149. Summer Flashbacks (episodes that people still talk about)
Frances Pollock on Regenerating Land & Food Systems
Our last summer flashback ‘episode that people still talk to me about’ is episode 9, with Frances Pollock (nee Jones). Frances and David Pollock became nationally famous about a decade ago now, for ‘destocking’ the 375,000-acre Wooleen Station in the Murchison region of Western Australia. That was step one in what has become an extraordinary story of regeneration, increasingly reverberating far beyond Wooleen. David’s since been on the podcast a few times, and Frances continues to be recognised and awarded for her work in the region.
Anthony and Frances outside the homestead at Wooleen Station (pic: Olivia Cheng).
“Even before the final credits of the story had gone, the phone rang. And before we could hang up from that phone call, the phone rang again, and the phone rang again. I thought, oh, if the phone’s ringing, I wonder if someone’s sent us an email. Well within 10 minutes from the story ending to checking our inbox there was already 270 emails.”
I also look back on this episode as a huge turning point for me and my family. This was the first episode out on Country, connecting directly with food and agricultural systems. I was set on a path of understanding regeneration, Country, agriculture, food and all other systems at greater depth, in the lived realities of people’s lives, in their places.
And while David Pollock was still a bit shy at this stage, at least with this bloke he’d never heard of, thankfully Frances wasn’t! And the names she sent us on our way with set up a transformative journey around Australia in 2018 that gave birth to The RegenNarration and everything it’s become to date.
This is an excerpt featuring the last 25 minutes or so of our conversation at the Wooleen Homestead. It picks up with their initial harrowing experiments with letting dingoes roam wild on the property. And on to another harrowing experiment with the bank as they were on the cusp of foreclosure, before the Australian public rallied behind them. We close with the Native Title judgement delivered at Wooleen, and all that might mean.
This conversation was recorded in late 2017.
Title slide: Frances Pollock (pic: Olivia Cheng).
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Please note this transcript isn’t perfect, but hopefully serves to provide greater access to these conversations for those who need or like to read.
SPEAKERS
Anthony James, Frances Pollock
Anthony 00:07
'Cattle, sheep, prosperity, First Australians, land on a knife edge, the politics of food, and a struggle for future sustainability - an Outback eco tourism experiment that challenges 100 years of European orthodoxy.' That's from the flyer at the remote Wooleen Station, where David Pollock and Francis Jones have radically destocked the land to regenerate it after more than a century of degradation. Despite a moving story of nearly going broke, dealing with outdated laws, and the politics around reintroducing a natural predator, they're finding ways to continue their vital project, and producing some really incredible outcomes. I'm Anthony James, and it was my good fortune to sit in the garden of the beautiful Wooleen homestead recently, and have this chat with station co manager, Francis Jones.
Anthony 00:59
Frances, thanks for joining us.
Frances 01:01
Thank you for having me.
Anthony 01:03
Now, we should start with a bit of a scene setter. Where did the Pollack family history, I suppose start at Wooleen.
Frances 01:11
David's father first visited Wooleen in 1954. We've actually got records in the visitor book from 1956. And a six year olds handwriting says thanks for having me loved your ducks, which is quite special. And then he came back to Wooleen in the 70s and jackarooed, and was the bookkeeper for a few stations in the district before buying [the lease] in 1990. So it's been 27 years now in the Pollock family, but obviously a much longer association going back to the 50s.
Anthony 01:44
So David grew up here - in your observation, how much does this place mean to David?
Frances 01:51
Yeah, I mean, you hear that saying, that the red dirt gets in your veins, and I think yeah, I mean, just having been here 10 years myself, yeah, I can't comprehend too just for him, that connection to country and that feeling that's evoked by growing up in a place like this that, you know, it is I dunno, in a weird way, like it is very spiritual, the country, you know, and especially I think anyone you know, anyone that's out here and meets Dave, and yeah, it's something that that connection is, yeah, it's very unique. It's very special. Yeah.
Anthony 02:25
So is this some of the essence I guess that kept you here? Because to get to your story - Well, let me ask before the time you arrived, because you came here on a two week working trip. So what what was happening for you, in the lead up to that that led you to make that decision?
Frances 02:43
Oh, to be honest, it was all sort of done a bit ad hoc. I grew up in Victoria. And then I moved to Perth for work. And I was sort of just going to maybe spend a year working around Western Australia before heading back to Victoria. In tourism.
Anthony 03:03
Ecotourism at that point?
Frances 03:04
Oh, it's funny, you say that, which probably I mean, it leads a little bit further down the track. But I had always been very passionate about sustainability. It was always really concerned about climate change. You know, that was sort of in my teenage years, I didn't really have a full grasp on it. I just knew I was worried about it. But on the other hand, I was very passionate about hospitality, tourism, customer service, I worked a lot in retail. And funnily enough, it had never actually occurred to me that you could combine both of those things into one job.
Anthony 03:35
Did somebody give you the tip or it occurred to?
Frances 03:37
It didn't occur to me until I got here! So yeah, so I was working in Perth, I met David's father. And funnily enough, my father came to Wooleen as a guest many, many years ago. Yeah. Isn't that like fate's such a weird thing. And so when I let dad know that I'd met David's father, he said oh you know, you should see if Brett can organize to get you out to the station. So I sort of asked the question, oh, kiddo, no worries. Just give me a moment. I'll give David a call. He's my son. I'm sure he will have you up there for two weeks if you want. Yeah, so yeah, so I came on up. Just gonna be two weeks, was happy to work in return to be able to experience the place really.
Anthony 03:37
So is that to say there were there was work that he was trying to attract people for, or it was not even really that, and you just fell into the place?
Frances 04:14
Yeah, he wasn't even trying to attract anyone, it was honestly his dad just called and said, I've met this girl that's, you know, do you think you could use an extra set of hands for two weeks? And Dave went yeah I guess so. Send her up.
Anthony 04:37
I was wondering how rigorous the selection process was. So not very much?
Frances 04:41
Not much. Probably my son's single and hey here's a single girl. No, I don't like to think that's what he was thinking. But if he was, not such a bad thing!
Anthony 04:51
That's right. credit where credit's due. I'm actually - it stands out to me a little, the story of Dave's dad brett in terms of the decision he made to, to have David manage the joint, which goes back to what 10, 12 years?
Frances 05:07
10 year anniversary three days ago. For Dave's management. Yeah.
Anthony 05:12
And that seems to be seems to me to be a fairly courageous decision. I mean, was there a sense that this was growing in him? Or was David really the Lone Ranger with his growing sensibility in this regard?
Frances 05:26
I think there's probably a little bit more crossover than what people realize leading up to the decision. Like David had been here working with his father, in the years leading up to, sadly, his mom passing away, which is what led to David's father wanting to pass the business along. And so they had, they'd both been to a few workshops together about landscape ecology, how to look at the hydrology of the landscape a little bit different, because it was very obvious, even to David's father that, you know, he started out running 14,000 sheep, they started the tourism and reduced the stocking number to 9000, to try and take some of that pressure off, yet they still weren't seeing an improvement in the landscape. Drought had them, you know, down to then 4000 heads still, though, like there was just no improvement in the landscape. So it was like, you know, there's something much bigger at play here. It's not just about reducing our stocking numbers, it, perhaps we really need to look at the whole system, like what are we doing wrong? So that was a bit of a conversation that was happening already. Dave's ideas were probably a little bit more drastic than what his dad was willing to entertain. But he was on the same rough sort of path, I think, as David was. So yeah, I guess with the whole decision making around David taking over the property, there was already a bit of a seed there planted for his dad, when he was sort of going through succession options. And and I wouldn't say that David's brother, you know, I think Richard also has quite a, you know, he's also very passionate about, you know, land care and improving landscapes as well. But I guess Dave's just a little bit more drastic!
Anthony 07:05
Not to have you speak for him entirely, but but I am curious, in in terms of where did it start to develop in in David, like, was it as a young kid? Or was it later in life when he was putting two and two together and seeing that, that negative trajectory that you're talking about? Where did it start?
Frances 07:22
On both fronts. So you know, and I think it's funny with some kids, you see, when they're little and they just got this, you know, there's just something in them that's a little bit different. And I think all the family photos, you go back anyone that describes Dave as a kid, I mean, he was the kid out putting redback spiders in jars and collecting snakes and building cubby houses, and his whole life was spent just absolutely immersed in the landscape. So you know, I think that's probably the first first inkling of you know, of this coming out in just a little Bushman that used to get around, you know, at Wooleen at a young age. And then from that it developed as well. He had a really a couple of really lovely indigenous mentors when he was younger. So I think getting that opportunity to be on on country with them and seeing how they, you know, say, and I don't think there was ever an intention there to pass on knowledge, but we're very lucky. And I guess the Pollock family in general are lucky to have a very close relationship with the Wadjuri people. So there's always been that passing on of knowledge. And then, it wasn't until was probably early 2000s. David met a South African - a couple of South African chaps, Ken Tinley, and Hugh Pringle, they're landscape ecologists, and they were running a program called EMU which is ecological management understanding. So and yeah, emu was all about looking at the way that water flows through your landscape. And so the boys came out and they ran a bit of a workshop on Wooleen. And they took Dave and his father out sort of onto country and, and just made them look at the country differently. They were like, see this over here? What do you think about it? And they're like, well, we've always just thought this and they said, well, as an ecologist, we're going to tell you that unfortunately, what we're looking at here is quite serious, you know. And so from that, funded by the Department of Agriculture, I think at the time they did quite a few good, like field trips around - one of them included going to a property in Alice Springs, run by a bloke called Bob Purvis. Yeah, so that and that's really what suddenly - I think David kind of thought partialism was a lost cause - he'd watched his parents struggle - he'd watched this continued decline in the landscape. He'd studied environmental management a little bit at Edith Cowan [University] out of school. So whilst he was, you know, on that path of, you know, land management and conservation, he was really disheartened with what he was seeing in the pastoral industry, until they went to see Bob Purvis's property in Alice Springs. And this guy, you know, he had mastered growing grass, ponding banks, waterflow on his property, having predators in the landscape, you know, he had it all. And he had fat cows that he was trucking out whilst all of his neighbors were in the midst of drought. And that's what made Dave realize that maybe it can be done. Maybe there's a way that we can learn to sustainably produce from the landscape. And from there, it's just grown. Yeah, he's sort of never really looked back since then.
Anthony 10:23
That struck the match. So with regards to the situation at Wooleen, you mentioned the Department of Agriculture. I mean, there seemed to be a time where they were really involved and invested and not so much now?
Frances 10:35
Yeah, well, that's certainly what we've seen. I mean, just in my 10 years, yeah, it just seems to me there's a bit of a withdrawal from the range lands, there's the funding, the support, the finance, it's just not there anymore, to provide people with the support they need to operate businesses. In I guess, what is quite clearly a degraded landscape. I mean, all the research papers are out there to show what's happening. The you know, the state put in monitoring sites clearly show a story. But yeah, like, it's, it's hard to understand. I guess for them, the problem that we're all faced with at the moment with landscape degradation is just so big that I just think they don't know how to tackle it. They just honestly don't know where to go.
Anthony 11:19
In terms of the situation, or how bad it got ...
Frances 11:24
I mean, the worst of the worst was the late 1930s 1940s. Late 1930s was probably the biggest drought we ever experienced out here. So it was four years that I can't tell you what the actual rainfall was exactly. But yeah, four years of consistent drought, I guess what some blokes probably in Queensland have been experiencing lately. So at the end of it, it was so severe, like the economic situation and the environmental situation. I mean, Wooleen lost 16,000 sheep just to starvation. Like they just died.
Anthony 11:57
Because the water was still being brought up from the bores.
Frances 11:59
Yeah, still pumping water. But the plants weren't growing. So they actually had a royal commission
Anthony 12:06
Which is stunning.
Frances 12:08
Yeah.
Anthony 12:08
And that was during the war.
Frances 12:09
Yeah. Yeah, that they were investing that money back then. But when you look back, I mean, the the Royal Commission was completely focused on the economic loss of the range lands, not so much the environmental, even though they reported, I think it was something like 25% of the acacia species were lost. And at some much larger, more than 50% of the saltbush species were also wiped out in that time. But the commission was completely aimed at how quickly they could get the show back on the road, how could they return economic viability? How could they help pastoralists restock once the rains had come?
Anthony 12:42
It's a bit like the broader sustainability dynamic now - even in terms of renewable energy, or whichever part we're talking about. It's how can we keep what we've been doing going at all costs? When when in fact, it might be what we've been doing that is not fitting this land that we found ourselves.
Frances 13:00
Exactly, yeah. And so there's been other instances of that, you know, over the last 130 years, you know, severe drought, stocking numbers declining all the time, landscape health declining all of the time. And even I think it was more around the 80s, that a lot of monitoring sites were put in around the range lands Northern and Southern in Western Australia
Anthony 13:20
That's a fairly slow response time from the inquiry.
Frances 13:22
Yeah ridiculously slow response time. And even those monitoring sites, when they were put in, like all the the land systems out here were assessed, their potential carrying capacities were also assessed. So how much stock could you potentially run in a river system, as opposed to a mulga paddock, to Lake systems? And, you know, I guess it was a potential carrying capacity. But, you know, we use those monitoring sites now as the basis for making decisions. Or when I say we like as a state, you know, the state of Western Australia use those monitoring sites as a basis for making decisions. But what a lot of people fail to realize is that I mean, the country was already buggered when they put them in.
Anthony 14:03
It's not the benchmark.
Frances 14:04
Yeah, like the benchmark we're using is so low, you know, so when things get better people go, Oh, fantastic. Things got better. But like, really, they're not that much better. And then when they report that things got worse and you think, how much worse could it possibly get? You know, like it was, it was pretty bad when they put them in.
Anthony 14:20
That is an interesting pattern, that normalization process, I guess, particularly generation by generation, where if there's no historical ... or if the historical memory is limited ... In that sense, the historical memory pre settlement, is there much? I know there's been increasing amount of documentation in general terms around the country of Aboriginal farming, no less, like not just accidental hunter gatherer or accidental opportunism sort of thing
Frances 14:49
No, that it was actually organized.
Anthony 14:50
Actually organized. Has there been any sort of history documented of that in these parts?
Frances 14:55
Unfortunately, I think so far we haven't kind of encountered any proper documentation of perhaps how the Wadjuri people used to farm and look after the land - not to say that it's not there, but so far we haven't had the chance to learn or experience it. What we do have though is a lot of the records of the early explorers as they came through Wooleen, so their written diaries. And when you read that, I mean, that in itself basically shows you that the landscape is so different now to what we were dealing with 130 years ago even. I mean, to think it changed so much in that timeframe is quite scary.
Anthony 15:28
Off the top of your head, do you recall enough to give us a sense?
Frances 15:31
Oh, one explorer talks about walking past a granite outcrop we've got on the property and describes grass up to the belly of his horse. And we don't even have a species that grows that high now, we don't even know what it was. Yeah, they they describe a lot of the landscape as more open grasslands, with, you know, mulga and gum trees spread amongst it, whereas now we've just got these thick thickets of, we call them woody weeds. They're not actually weeds. They're native species, but they're the species that increase under grazing pressure. So yeah, the landscape in itself is very different to how the early explorers describe it. And there is actually incidents in some of their diaries, where they come across, obviously, Aboriginal settlements, or, you know, areas that the Wadjuri people have been living in. And they do describe, you know, certain ways that campfires are designed, things that look like they could be shelters. So we know that the history is out there, it's just a matter of of tracking it down, and then working out how to apply it to, to our situation now.
Anthony 16:35
Which comes back a bit, I suppose, but we might talk a bit later about the lack of attention that it is getting, because there is this research need and possibility, which could turn up vital knowledge. But let's just stick with something we were talking about a bit before off air, where where we were talking about what is the benchmark essentially? So what are we trying to get back to or forward to - what are we trying to regenerate to, before, for example, you might reintroduce stock in a concerted fashion knowing that you have in bits and pieces to keep viable? But let's start with that benchmark, do you have a sense of what you're aiming for?
Frances 17:08
Yeah, and that's a difficult one - we have a lot of people say to us, you know, what are we bothering for? Like, you know, we'll never get it back to what it was. But as you say, what do we class, you know, a pristine environment? And you know, are we aiming for pre any human settlement? Are we going like 40,000 years back? 20,000? Do we just want to look at pre white settlement? Do we just want to look at pre large stocking numbers? So and that's why I think, for us, we're certainly not trying to, we're not trying to get back to the most pristine environment we could imagine. Because we don't know what that looks like. You know, I think all landscapes are always changing and evolving, whether that's, you know, just natural, or manmade change. But I think for us just to be able to see a functioning landscape, and I think it you know, doesn't take a rocket scientist to go out there at the moment and say that it's not functioning, you only need to see the water and wind erosion, the bare flats, you know, it's, that's not a functioning landscape. So yeah, what we're trying to get back to, I guess, we don't really know ourselves. But we're not aiming for perfection, like, nobody can do that. So I think, to see, to see the hydrology working the way it should, yeah, and slow that down - the erosion and to get a lot more ground cover, you know, that that would be - we'd be wrapped.
Anthony 18:34
So let's continue on that, I guess, local goal and talk about how that might apply more broadly. So the regeneration process so far, sounds and looks like it's been studying in some respects. I mean, it's clearly relatively early days. But I mean, it is stunning to see that lake, well both lake beds, covered in perennial grass. And then grasses coming up, where previously there was nothing, which is what you want, right, throughout the scrub?
Frances 19:05
Yeah, absolutely. I think I mean, yeah, just on Wooleen alone, it's I guess, we're 10 years in, on the project. Probably got plenty more to go. But yeah, we've definitely seen a huge recovery of species. And it's the perennials that we're really worried about, not so much the annuals, I mean, annuals are a nice bonus, and you'll only get them with rain, but they're short term, and they're not a good indicator of your success. So yeah, we've seen I mean, the lake bed and the river systems have probably been the best, the best recovery for us. And I think that's, you know, that's shown just from how degraded the landscape is. So what we find now is when we get rain and the high country - though I must admit anyone that comes here, it's pretty flat - but we do we do have high country and low country. So the high country now because of the erosion, the water runs off much faster than it used to. It doesn't soak into the soil the way it did. What it actually means is our low country, the low country gets twice as much water as it did before. So the rivers and the lakes now are getting Yeah, a lot, a lot more rainfall on them. Whereas the high country is actually being starved of water because it's running off. So we've seen fantastic recovery in the lower lower areas along the river and the lake, the creek beds, the mulga is going to take a lot longer - the mulga is where the sort of high country is. But even there, though, you, you see very subtle improvements all the time, it might just be as simple as having a little bit more leaf litter on the ground. We're starting to see little colonies of plants - a lot, namely, like your salt bushes, blue bushes, and things like that growing underneath the mulga trees or Carrara bushes where they're protected from grazing pressure. Because whilst we are de-stocked, you got to consider the total grazing pressure of the landscape. So you've got your domesticated stock, but you've also got your native animals, then your feral animals as well, to control when you're managing grazing pressure. So yeah, I mean, it does bring a real smile to your face, I guess when you are driving around, and you can see ground cover where there wasn't ground cover before. We've got a lot of monitoring photos as well, because it is easy when you live here and you're looking at it all the time to not notice the subtle changes.
Anthony 19:06
Yeah that's right, but you've been pretty meticulous with that?
Frances 20:24
Yeah, it's a fairly regular thing, I guess we try to get out and take photos, same position, same time of the day, you know, trying to line up all the trees in the same photo. That's Dave's favorite job.
Anthony 21:30
He'd probably want an army of people out here just to do that hey?
Frances 21:32
Just to take photos, yeah, and actually just taking photos, it's amazing, a visitor the other day brought back some photos from the 1960s. And it's amazing how just people's happy snaps, you can take back to the same spot that they took them whilst you know at the time, they probably never thought that this would happen. But you can also use that as a measure to go, God look. There's that jackaroo standing next to the gum tree on Murchison River. Well, let's go back to that same gum tree ...
Anthony 21:58
Well, that's the funny thing with some of those older records of pre colonial times too, that they're often just in sort of almost scrapbook bound stuff that only one person cared to produce, sort of thing. And there it and that's our record. And then it's got it's importance when you ...
Frances 22:13
It does have an importance later down the track when you would have never thought it at the time. Yeah.
Anthony 22:17
So that's 10 years in, and you've got a bit of a sort of a timeframe, at least that you're working to - not that you know how it's going to roll out. What's that?
Frances 22:25
Yeah, I mean, I think there's at least another 10 years worth of hard slog ahead of us just for some of those riparian areas. Some of the up- country could be 20, 25 years in the making. And there's some areas where I don't know if it's a bit pessimistic, but we we wonder whether we will ever see it return to health in our lifetime.
Anthony 22:46
Like where it's down to a rock out there in some places?
Frances 22:49
Yeah, that's it. Where you've exposed so much sort of wind and water erosion on the place that to rebuild that soil structure will be lifetimes of correct management.
Anthony 23:02
In terms of the broader picture, is it something you're connecting with others on to try to learn from each other? And is there a broader goal, I suppose in mind country wide - like how is it connected with a broader scenario across Australia?
Frances 23:15
I mean, we've always said that what's happening on Wooleen, I mean, whilst I guess it is, obviously, for our benefit, we live here and we want to see the country healthy. And the, you know, the bigger goal, though, is about perhaps trying to create a bit of a model that perhaps other people can look to. I wouldn't want to suggest that everyone will do what we do. Yeah, we do get some people coming and go, Oh, I wish more people do what you guys are doing. But it's not that simple. Just to replicate what we're doing. I mean, it's yeah, it's context. And Dave and I have looked at, and particularly Dave looked at so many different systems, and we've grabbed bits out of everyone else's system. And so we can only hope that down the future that Wooleen will be another one of those models that someone else might come along and go, Wow, we love that we love that we love that, that's no good, but, you know, if they take something away and can implement it in a way that works for them, then that's really important. We've got certainly over a lot of the Southern range lands and a little bit into the northern rangelands of WA, you know, a couple of other key properties that we talk to quite regularly and there's a lot of, I guess, healthy discussion that goes on there about, you know, I think everyone's sort of aiming for the same thing over those few properties. How we all get there, as I said, is very different. Everyone's got their own model and way of achieving things. But you know, it's it's really lovely to talk to somebody who's on the same page as you are - aiming for the same things as you are. I think, you know, I think all pastoralists have it in them too. They all love their country. I mean, that's why they live out here. You know, it's why they've chosen a life that they have. Some people though, their capacity to look after the country as much as they want to, can be limited for all sorts of reasons. But a lot of them, you know, we touched on briefly before the Ag department, I mean, there's just a real lack of support for implementing sustainable grazing systems and managing healthy land. You know, and the problem out here has sort of evolved into such a big one that now not just Department of Agriculture, I mean Department of Lands, the whole of the WA Government just don't really know how to deal with it. And as a state as well, it's been very focused on mining, as a pastoral lease it's really just taken a backburner. It's a bit too hard for them to tackle.
Anthony 23:22
So is there looking to organize more effectively, politically, is there any sort of movement towards that anywhere in the country or around here?
Frances 25:42
I think there has been over the years, there's been a lot of range land reform, there's been a lot of proposed bills that have never really made it over the line just to change the legislation under which pastoral leases exist.
Anthony 25:54
Let's talk a bit about those barriers. So that's an old one. But it's such a vital one, that seems to be slow in changing as well. Where is that at? The fact that you're a lease holder, and it can only be for running sheep or cattle? Is that right?
Frances 26:08
Yeah. So that's it. I think that I mean, that's another big misconception we have from people that come to visit, is that, you know, we, Dave and I, must own Wooleen. But it's public land.
Anthony 26:19
It's public land. Australians own this, basically.
Frances 26:21
Yeah. As a bit of a fun fact, I think 80% of Western Australia alone is pastoral lease. So our lease states that basically we have the right to graze the native vegetation, graze being with an animal, if I personally wanted to go and pick it myself, I need a license to do that. My lease gives me the right to graze the native vegetation. And there's only three specified stock. That's sheep, cows, and more recently, legislation was amended to include goats. Because I guess the feral goat population became so out of hand. And then there then became a market for said goats that they actually became a legal animal to run in the range lands.
Anthony 27:03
Just on that, I guess on the one hand, a positive effort to harness a new natural force. But on the other hand, is it true to say they're diabolical in terms of that regeneration process?
Frances 27:15
Oh, yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, most goats in the range lands are completely unmanaged. There's a few properties that have managed to run viable, managed goat operations. But when you're just running, you know, an unbeknown number of goats amongst your stocking rate of cows or sheep, along with your grazing native animals, you've got no control over your grazing pressure. And Dave always says, If you can't control your grazing pressure, then you're absolutely fooling yourself to think that you can manage your property.
Anthony 27:19
And that grazing pressure is actually upwards of half that comes from kangaroos, and goats. Upwards of half the grazing pressure in this region.
Frances 27:55
Yeah, there was a study done by the Department of Ag in the 90s, that showed that more than half of the grazing pressure in the range lands was actually feral goats and kangaroos, it wasn't actually domesticated stock.
Anthony 28:04
This is highly relevant when we're talking about the dingo strategy here. Yeah, where you've stopped culling the dingoes on this property. And it sounds like, speaking to David last night, it's, for all intents and purposes, it's worked in terms of restoring an ecology that that brings roos and goats, well it essentially takes goats out of the picture, and brings roos back into a balance with the territory.
Frances 28:31
Yeah. And that I mean, and that story, also, it takes us back to Bob Purvis, who we were talking about earlier from the Northern Territory. And what I forgot to mention is, after Dave had been to Bob's property in the Northern Territory, and seen that maybe there was a chance, Bob actually came over to the Murchison area, and visited a few of the properties. And David specifically asked him at the time, like, what do I need to do? Like, what's the answer? And Bob's response to Dave at the moment was, what you really need is a semi trailer full of dingoes. And everyone kind of went hahaha, yeah, very funny. So what do we really need to do? That was something that stuck in Dave's mind for such like so many years, years. What does he mean, I need a truck load of dingoes, you know? And there's always been little case studies out there, there's always been, you know, people quietly talking about the potential impacts of allowing a top predator to exist in the landscape.
Anthony 29:20
Because it happened overseas to hey, with the wolves in North America, that as far as I know, has had a similar ... well, not surprising, I mean if you are working with an integrated system, an idea of an integrated system, then it's not surprising or out there strategy.
Frances 29:34
No, it's absolutely not. So I think, yeah, we - I think it's something that like David always thought about. And so when, you know, we took over the management in the first few years, we didn't see, didn't see dingoes, you'd say maybe the odd dog track around. And I think we just decided to sit on the fence for a little bit. You know, it was a few years in before Dave actually saw his first dingo on Wooleen. And so, you know, I guess that was, you know, a little bit sort of a confronting ...
Anthony 30:06
A moment to decide.
Frances 30:06
Yeah a moment to decide - do I get out the gun? Or do I just let it on its way? And he chose to let it on its way. And so since then we've sort of, you know, we've watched the way they've impacted on Wooleen. And I think, to be honest, I mean, we would say hands down, despite everything that we've done personally, they have had a much bigger impact on landscape rehabilitation than we ever will. Purely because I mean, as we know, and it's Australia wide agricultural debate, small stock and dingoes don't mix - and we would never advocate that they that, you know, people trying to run goats or sheep could possibly have a healthy Dingo population on properties the size of Wooleen.
Anthony 30:48
So if you're going to stock it's going to be cattle, to be able to run it like this?
Frances 30:52
Yeah, to be able to run it like this. Yeah, so far, I haven't really come across a model where you could run dingoes and sheep together. It's a pretty sad one. But yeah, so basically, the dingoes have effectively removed all goats off Wooleen. We went from like, yeah, transporting out a few thousand feral goats a year, knowing that we missed a few thousand out there in the landscape to now, you can't find one, you absolutely can't find one.
Anthony 31:15
That's remarkable. And to give a bit more context, I have to mention for listeners that that you actually went on an intensive cull of roos because there were just 10s of 1000s. And that grazing pressure was acute, even though you'd de-stocked in that conventional sense. And so you culled about 5000 roos, and didn't make a perceivable dent?
Frances 31:36
Not a perceivable dent. No.
Anthony 31:38
So that's the context of this. But of course, then, it's not - others around you are still running smaller livestock. And so that, that has been obviously a point of contention with some neighbors. And I guess the the law? So how's that gone?
Frances 31:55
I think it's worth mentioning that, like, I guess there's the whole Dingo versus wild dog debate. Yeah. And so, like, you know, if we see a wild dog, you know, we're talking about a domesticated dog that's bred with another domesticated dog that's gone wild that, you know, like, definitely, they're culled, they're gone. You know, we don't want wild dogs, no one wants wild dogs. But dingoes, you know, there's, there's been a lot of DNA studies done out here, you know, we see the dogs that are on Wooleen. For all purposes and intent, the law states that even a dingo is considered a wild dog, when you're just looking at terminology. Whether you're a domesticated dog gone wild, or you're a dingo, they're all classed as wild dogs. So I think that's sometimes where the issue gets confused a little bit.
Anthony 32:41
There's a cultural story, there, isn't it, the way we've perceived an animal that's been here for a lot longer than us?
Frances 32:47
Yeah, that's it. And I think I mean, the other thing that we think, like, we've been trying to get dingoes out of this country forever, you know, like for years and years and years and years, for 130 years in fact.
Anthony 32:58
Yeah, that's right. In settler terms, forever.
Frances 33:00
Yeah. In settler terms. So I just feel like if we are still 130 years down the track trying to get rid of dingoes, well, does that not say that perhaps the way we're doing it's wrong? Maybe we need to look at a different model whereby we can coexist, if possible. I know, our state government at the moment is, you know, perhaps about to put a bit of money into dog fencing. You know, and maybe that's a solution for, for small stock producers, you know, perhaps they need that security of a fence, but certainly, in you know, in range land country where you're running cattle, you can manage or eradicate your feral graziers, then the benefits or landscape we've seen, just, I mean, they far outweigh any benefit that doesn't have doesn't have dingoes in it.
Anthony 33:48
Yes, David was saying the, the take of calves, if you were running cattle, the take of calves is at a maximum sort of very low - 10% risk or something. And then compared to your 50% plus of grazing impact from those excess numbers of others.
Frances 34:05
Yeah, we sort of done the math, we've worked out that yeah, that's it. If we had cows on the property, and we lost 10% of our calves to dogs - dingos - we would still financially be ahead - and environmentally - because we've lowered the unmanaged grazing pressure on the property by 50%. And the cows are still going to be healthier and fatter because they've got more available feed, and the landscape is still going to function better because it doesn't have feral goats and other feral animals tearing it apart. Wooleen is still going to be better off in the long run by having dingoes than not.
Anthony 34:06
Because the system's working as a whole.
Frances 34:39
Yeah. I mean, it's been a long time. I think the last time we actually shot a proper feral dog was probably four years ago now. I mean, there's even studies to show that because dingoes work in such a hierarchy and they have a pack mentality, they would never accept a wild dog. Dingoes actually take care of wild dogs if you allow them to stabilize their pack structure, you know, have an alpha male, alpha female ...
Anthony 35:03
Again, that the system's in tact.
Frances 35:04
That's it. I mean, you know, where Dave can, he still does go along to community baiting days to, you know, just to throw in his time and resources so that the baits are available to other people. You know, I wouldn't say religiously we always make it but where we've got the time we go along to help. And, you know, if we are fortunate enough to get a bag of baits, you know, look, we'll probably just spread them along our southern boundary, because it is our neighbors to the south that still run sheep.
Anthony 35:34
It's telling too from from the outside to see the ways that you're trying to, I guess to make it work in a, I guess a non fundamentalist sense, from the point of view of still being connected with the community you're in and trying to give as much as you're trying to say, hey, we're looking at something that's for the good of the whole as well, and hopefully you can bear with us a bit, and we'll work with you a bit and find a way.
Frances 35:59
Yeah, it is a real difficult one. Like over the 10 years, as you said before, we have run a few small herds of cows just to, you know, just financially keep afloat and make things work for us. You know, it's been very sort of tightly managed to make sure we don't undo any of the long term work we're trying to achieve. But you know, it's easy to get criticized by people like, what would you know, about wild dog attacks? You guys don't have any stock? You know, you're the crazy greenies on the other side of the fence. What would you know about running Cows and dogs together? And look, I completely understand where they're coming from. And it can be very easy to say, to say that. But you know, on the same token, we have, you know, over the 10 years, it's probably about four, four years, we have run cows on the property. Dave and I have sat out on the Wooleen Lake together at sunset, having a drink, we, we do a thing called counting the cows! It's more a matter of just sitting with them, and just so they get that human interaction, they're sort of a quieter, a quieter animal then. But you know, we've sat out there and watched, you know, watch the dingo sort of slink along in the grass. You know, and I do remember the first time I saw that just thinking oh no, like, you know, maybe everything we've always thought is not, you know, maybe we're about to learn a lesson here, especially at the time, I had a few potty calves that had just got to the age that I would reintroduce them back to the herd. And I thought, This is it, like my babies are gonna go. Like, I've spent all these months bottle feeding them, and now they're out here on the lake without a proper mother. And I was sure the next night when we went out, they'd be gone. But no, they were there. We've never lost, as far as we know, none of our calves have ever come back in marked, scratched. There hasn't been a noticeable calf loss that makes us go, Oh, God, where have all the calves gone? We've never had any of those indicators to show that we're actually experiencing a problem as a result of having dingoes and cows in the landscape.
Anthony 38:00
There is a broader body of evidence too, so you weren't going in blind. It was supposed to work that way.
Frances 38:05
Yeah, that's it. We had hopefully enough research and evidence under our belts to know that it would work. And then obviously, you know, there's the test - there's the dingo slinking out next to the cows, you know, couple of 100 meters away, but it was fine.
Anthony 38:21
So, no cattle on the site right now. But the idea is, so you're thinking basically, as, as I understand it, that, that it's an opportunity in these parts to continue to run cattle, in an Australian context, in a food supply context, or a human context - like, should we even bother, like why have stock, do we even do this? That there's an opportunity here, because this particular land is not suited to crops as far as you can tell?
Frances 38:52
It's not no.
Anthony 38:53
That if we're going to choose to continue to eat meat in some form, it's this sort of territory, that possibly - you're going to try and find out - could work.
Frances 39:03
Yeah that's it. And I think, when you look at the range lands, I mean, they're generally described as sort of semi arid areas that still have their native vegetation. There also deemed generally not viable for growing crops. So Wooleen has an average rainfall of about 210 mils a year, you can't grow a crop in that kind of rainfall belt. So if we're going to use the land for something, then pastoralism seems like a reasonable use of the land especially if you're looking as you said, in a food system aspect. And especially the land is so vast and it is so arid, that, you know, for us to physically go out there and collect food ourselves, it makes sense that you send an animal out there to harvest the energy, the energy the landscape's providing, and then you bring that animal back in, you know, and process it from there. Whereas Yeah, where you do grow crops, I mean, it's a high energy intense area. And it doesn't really make sense in a lot of our food systems now where we're almost like, grow crops to feed them to animals to eat the animals ...
Anthony 40:06
Yeah extremely inefficient.
Frances 40:07
Yeah, that's it. And we look at a lot of the sort of factory farming models. Yeah, it's bizarre, like, you know, in a world where there's so much poverty and such. Yeah, shortage of food supply. You know, we just think in the future, we're like, Yeah, I'd love to think it's within our lifetime. But who knows, we're just, you know, we're definitely going to have to get a lot cleverer about how we produce food. Look, Dave and I love a good steak. But at the same time, we also believe that we probably need to drastically reduce the amount of meat that we eat as a society. It's not sustainable. No, and not healthy. So we think, you know, we need to reduce the amount of food that we eat. We need to look at the way we produce it. And more and more, so the environment is going to be, you know, it's so much more important to being able to have that long term food supply security.
Anthony 40:58
Yeah. And in terms of the viability then, a few years ago, is it true to say you almost had to pack it up?
Frances 41:05
Yeah, we did.
Anthony 41:06
Numbers weren't stacking up?
Frances 41:07
Numbers definitely weren't stacking up. Yeah, that would have been 2012 I'd say. We knew things were really bad. We were sort of fudging white lies everywhere. With all you know, all of our people that were financing us people we owed money to, the poor old supermarket.
Anthony 41:28
You had a tab going at the supermarket?
Frances 41:30
Yeah, quite a big one. Yeah, and it did, it got to the point where the bank just called and said, Look, guys, how's it going? Because looks really out of hand, we can see, you know, interest is four months overdue. We've sort of been watching this trend in your cash flow, it doesn't really look healthy.
Anthony 41:51
What an anxious time for you both I imagine?
Frances 41:53
Yeah, it was sort of knowing that all that was stacking up and then to actually have the bank call. And you know, and say that. And they basically at that time, banks can be quite harsh can't they? I mean, they've got a business to run themselves, but mmm ...
Anthony 42:07
Yeah that's right. The nature of the business could use some regeneration. Well, in fact, it is. Our first podcast was a guy who's doing just that - regenerating the finance system.
Frances 42:14
Oh wow there you go. So yeah, the bank basically just said, Look, we're basically giving you 12 days to find those overdue interest payments. And then what the bank didn't realize is God knows how many more 10s of 1000s we owe to local businesses, just like the supermarket, you know, so to try and find the interest as well as all these guys, because we're always going to pay the locals before we paid the bank. You know, and they said, Look, yeah, we'll give you the 12 days, but time's up, really. And that was really, I mean the amount of money the interest came to like, I mean, there, there was no way we were going to find that money.
Anthony 42:51
So how did you get through?
Frances 42:52
Um, well, I mean, this phone call happened, it was probably two or three days before our Australian Story went to air in 2012. And I do remember after that call, sitting on the kitchen floor on the tiles. Because it was summertime, it's pretty hot. And the tiles are a cool place to sit in the middle of summer. I think I had a bit of a tear.
Anthony 43:15
Yeah, no, that's exactly what I imagined.
Frances 43:18
Dave was probably a bit stronger than I was. But we both just kind of went well, you know what, we tried. You know, that was always the goal to give it a go. It failed. That probably says something in itself about sustainable models. And we weren't, you know ...
Anthony 43:30
Well, in the current structures.
Frances 43:31
Yeah. Within the current structure of what we're allowed to do on a pastoral lease. We knew Australian Story was going to air and we both kind of went well, what a nice way to go out. Like it'll be nice to think, closing scences, like yeah, at least, you know, at least we could say, people knew that we tried. The message would get out there before we had to leave.
Anthony 43:57
Well, nothing is lost in that respect. But, you are still here. So what happened?
Frances 44:00
So, you know, I guess we honestly, we could have never really anticipated what the response to Australian story was going to be like. I mean, I think even before the last credits - there's my guinea fowl in the background for anyone listening. Yeah, I mean, even before the final credits of the story had gone like the phone rang. And before we could hang up from that phone call, the phone rang again, the phone rang again. I thought, Oh, I'll go and see if like the phone's ringing, I wonder if someone's sent us an email. Well you know what, within 10 minutes from the story ending to checking our inbox there was already like 270 emails that had come in and that was just in the first 10 minutes. And basically, in the ensuing couple of weeks, the mail comes out twice a week. And every mail run there would just be another letter from someone in Australia with a staple cheque. Just saying please guys use this. This is just a gift to you guys. And they didn't even know at the time, obviously what was happening to us behind the scenes financially. I mean, they didn't know we'd been given 12 days to get our act together. Yeah, it was just so beautiful. And I like, I don't know, we we really can't ever thank those people enough for what they did. We even had one couple send us a cheque for a few hundred dollars and said, Hi, guys, this isn't for Wooleen, this is for you two. Can you please go to Geraldton for a night, go out to dinner and have a drink on us? Like it was so it was just - we were blown away by the generosity and kindness of the Australian public. And yeah, I guess within those next couple of weeks, we had enough money to put the bank at rest. And to put them aside and then obviously, you know what that did for our tourism business - the amount of people that wanted then to actually come and see for themselves what was happening out here. What was in the outback, what was Wooleen, you know, that that helped us that year to get out of, you know, the greater pickle that was paying all those bills.
Anthony 46:10
How does it sit today? I guess the tourism is the main source of income?
Frances 46:15
Yeah, exactly.
Anthony 46:16
You've got adopt an acre, I see. That'd be your donation portal?
Frances 46:19
Yeah, that's it. And so I mean, just to touch on the adopt an acre, that was born out of the fact that we had all these like generous people just sending us money. And it made me so uneasy, because I always thought they don't even they don't even know me. How could they just send off money to someone they don't even know? And then I felt really accountable for it. Like how, you know, how do they know you that I used it to do something worthwhile? I mean, so that's, that's basically where the adopt an acre program was - how can we actually channel it through a proper, like a system to show what we're using the money for - that, you know, and they get something in return for that just to show our appreciation. But tourism is definitely, it's the main industry for us now, at the moment. Yeah, tourism for us has kind of reached that funny level where we either need to expand it, which will obviously incur considerable investment, or Yeah, or do you just do better rather than do bigger? So we're really sort of stuck between what road we want to take. And I think for Dave and I, we both really enjoy that real personal side of it, making sure that we have genuine relationships with the people that come to stay with us, rather than having hundreds of people through the door in one week that don't ever really leave feeling like they got what they came for. So I think for us, it's probably going to be do better rather than bigger. Tourism will always be a part of what we do even I think as the years go by, and we start that reintroduction of cattle and perhaps running a more permanent herd than what we have been over the last few years, I know that tourism will always play a role in what we do here. And we just see tourism as a really a really good way to educate people. And I think until if you can't experience that, then you can't understand it. And it's a really lovely way that Yeah, especially I mean, Dave's so passionate about the landscape. And look, he really loves his stock work as well. He loves nothing more than sitting on a bike behind a mob of cows and talking to them. But yeah, I mean, unless people get the chance to come out here and experience for themselves. They won't they won't get it. So it's a chance for him to share his passion with people in a controlled way that yeah, he can really show them the country through his eyes as well.
Anthony 48:30
It seems increasingly important as more people drift to cities, for us to have some kind of understanding, and someplace to go. And of course, to have some political constituency, any number of voters to actually make the sorts of structural legal changes you're talking about. Maybe just to to start to wind us down, but I'm really interested to come back to the indigenous connection. So your closest neighbor, I believe, is the local, indigenous community?
Frances 48:55
Yeah. I'm trying kilometers. I mean, as the crow flies, probably only 20, 25 kilometers away we've got Pia Wadjuri. So the local group out here is Yamaji Wadjuri people. So Pia Wadjuri community, it's actually the first Aboriginal community established in Western Australia. Because the local Wadjuri people helped John Forrest on one of his very early expeditions throughout Western Australia.
Anthony 49:22
Another story of such assistance. That is interesting.
Frances 49:24
That's it. So some silly white fella came out on a horse in the middle of summer thinking he'd find water in a semi arid environment. So the Wadjuri people kindly showed him
Anthony 49:34
And he found people to show him.
Frances 49:35
Yeah, that's it ... they showed him to a cave where he could get water and sort of save the expedition. I think they lost a few horses and their boots and all their possessions, but he survived. So as a gift, he designated Pia Wadjuri Aboriginal community to them. Probably not on a patch of land they wanted but the gesture was was there. So yeah, so we're very fortunate to have them right next door.
Anthony 49:56
So do you have much interaction or through programs?
Frances 50:00
Yeah, so I mean, we've got a few different - I mean, aside from the fact that your neighbors, and you know, talk to you neighbors as you do, you know, they'll always be our first port of call if there's any mustering. I mean, the guys there. I mean, they know the land like the back of their hands, you know, you can't go wrong. And they're really good Stockman as well, because they don't push things too hard, happy to just go along slowly, slowly and make it happen.
Anthony 50:20
There's a cultural trait in there that's more broadly applicable too hey? Even with regards to how you're stocking land, the whole bit?
Frances 50:25
That's it. Some people are just ah, too much in a rush. But yeah, they've certainly got that difference.
Anthony 50:31
Yeah, it's the force/dominate mode. Which is the European cultural mode, historically, versus the fit and guide and work with it, yeah
Frances 50:39
Yeah, work with the landscape, rather than against it. And we've got a couple of key people that come over to work with us with some school groups. So we have a few few school groups come up from Perth, and they really love the chance to learn a bit about the Wadjuri culture.
Anthony 50:55
And the Native Title ceremony and judgment that you will be hosting out here, I'm curious about what's going to happen on the day - like actually what it looks like when this sort of thing happens? And then of course, the implications or the hopes you have for it?
Frances 51:07
Yeah, I mean, what it will look like, good question. I'm actually getting my head around that a little bit at the moment. But I guess, I mean, the whole Native Title issue is, it's far more complex than probably I could ever describe.
Anthony 51:20
I'm sure it is!
Frances 51:21
And I'm not sure legally, I probably got my head around the right terminology. But we're all very aware of the Mabo decision. That, you know, the Aboriginal people recognized as the original custodians of the land. So that that decision, you know, obviously meant a lot of good. It's also caused a lot of heart ache, I think for for everyone, you know, not not just white people, but also for aboriginal cultures, there's been a lot of hard work as well, still getting recognized despite the decision being handed down. So in this area here, we have been working through a native title process for I feel like it's 25 years now. So I guess for one of the one of the things out here is we need to determine what area the Wadjuri people used to exist in, and then who is actually Wadjuri? So that that process has been going on for a very long time. You know, much to the dismay, I think of a lot of the local guys out here.
Anthony 51:36
That's a torturously long time.
Frances 51:38
Oh, yeah, it is, I think for the for the people that are on the ground. I mean, like for us here, for a lot of our neighbors, for the guys living next door at Pia, you know, we just see it as a very simple, you know, yeah, a very simple way
Anthony 52:32
Like almost self-evident.
Frances 52:32
Yeah, to go forward. But of course, it you know, that it's got to go through courts and lawyers and all these things that seem to drag it out a little bit. So we do, I think it's in two weeks, roughly two weeks time, we finally after 25 years, got to a point where the federal court will be traveling out to Wooleen. So we feel pretty honored that Wooleen's been chosen as the location to have that, coz we've got absolutely no influence. I mean, the Wadjuri area is an enormous area, but they've chosen Wooleen as being so significant that they would like to have the federal court determination handed down on Wooleen. So I think I mean, even once that's handed down, there's still I think, a good 12 to 24 months to go yet before it's completely sort of settled. But I think, you know, we just kind of hope that in the future, it's going to make a lot easier for negotiation to happen. So like before, we touched on the fact that Wooleen is a pastoral lease, we're not allowed to change the type of lease we have, unless we can negotiate Native Title. Because that Act has come into play since the lease was originally established. So any future land use has to be negotiated. The issue at the moment is without that, I guess, federal court ruling, you don't always know who you're negotiating with. If the determination hasn't happened to say, Who is Wadjuri and what is Wadjuri land, then how do you negotiate to to change or to do something better in the future?
Anthony 53:05
And that's a long period of time to not know.
Frances 54:04
Yeah, so we're kind of hoping it'll be really good for everybody in the future. That, you know, those guys can be recognized, you know, for their right to the land. And I think that's a really big issue too, in indigenous culture, and especially everything that's happened over the last even just say 50 years. You know, that just displacement from country? Yeah, like, I think it'd be really important, like we're looking forward to they're saying, potentially 250 to 300 people are going to come out to Wooleen for that hearing. And it'll be really, really lovely just to have so many people back on country, you know, for them having people on country is healthy. You know, they say that the country is sick now because they're not on it anymore. They're gone. So it'd be really lovely.
Anthony 54:47
Fair argument too.
Frances 54:48
Yeah, very fair argument. They're not out here managing it, looking after it, being in it. So the determination itself is going to be held out at a granite outcrop on Wooleen, the other side of the Wooleen Lake, and that's quite a significant place for them. There's a lot of stories associated with that rock. Yeah, part of a Dreamline.
Anthony 55:06
And increasingly, and it's funny how often this happens too, it's a pretty significant site for you guys too. And I say how often it happens, that there's sort of an innate draw to these significant sites that, also over thousands of years, but also to just recent arrivals?
Frances 55:20
Yeah, exactly. Like it's, you know, it's obviously been an important part of their culture for 40,000 years, but even even in our timeframe, and even the Sharp family that owned Wooleen before the Pollock family did I mean, this particular granite outcrop has always stood out as a bit of a beacon of a real spiritual, lovely place to go. I mean, it's where we take our sunset tours now just to give people that, that vast understanding of just how big you know, the landscape is and what is out there. It's Yeah, it's funny how, between cultures and time, it's, yeah, there's certain places that just are special.
Anthony 55:55
And I believe that relates to the song you're going to send us out with?
Frances 55:59
Yeah. So the granite outcrops on Wooleen are very special. Dave and I, after being together now nearly 10 years got married about five months ago. Yeah. So that did take place at one of the granite outcrops on Wooleen. Yeah, so I thought the song I'd leave you guys with is our first dance, which is a song by The Waifs called Love Serenade.
Anthony 56:22
Beautiful. Thanks Frances. It's been terrific having you on.
Frances 56:24
Not a problem. Thanks for having me.
Anthony 56:33
That was Frances Jones, one half of the impressive couple regenerating the remote Wooleen Station. For more on Frances, David and the vital work being done at Wooleen, including how to support it and of course visit, follow the links in our program details. And stay tuned for David's book out soon. My name is Anthony James. We thanks to Ben Moore on production, see you next time.
Find more:
Hear the rest of our conversation back in episode 9.
Hear more of Frances with David and Charlie Massy on episode 16.
And hear more from David (eventually) on episodes 44, 66 & 111 (what’s with the repeating numbers?!) – episode 111 has links to all the others, and more.
Music:
Let Me Know, by the Public Opinion Afro Orchestra.