Max's parents bought the 468 acre property in 1940. Milking cows, they managed the property with only two paddocks. Max's Father died when he was 11 years old, so he would help his mother after school and at weekends to run the farm until he was 16, when he left school and farmed full time. At the age of 21 Max inherited the original property.
Max had already bought a neighbouring property before he married Pam in 1967 and they have been buying extra bits of land nearly every decade since. The family now own about 600 hectares (1482 acres) and are farming cattle with their two married sons Scott and Brooke who both work off the farm to supplement the income.
Over the years they have had financially very difficult periods of time, for example, when the interest rates shot up from 15-21 per cent over a period of two months. They are still in debt but with the price of land they remain capital rich but cash poor.
Scott and Brooke are both interested in leasing initially and then taking over the land so the hand-over (albeit somewhat reluctantly on Max's part) is beginning. Scott is very 'switched on' which his mother finds exhausting. He talks non-stop about farming and the varying methods, always trying to include his Father in furthering his own knowledge of agricultural systems.
2006 has been the hardest year Max has ever experienced both due to the drought and succession concerns. He remains stoically optimistic that he will be able to grow fodder crops under the pivot irrigator but feeding is a constant headache. Not only has the pasture disappeared, so too has most of the water in the many dams, necessitating having to water large mobs at the creek and river. They would like to have water pumped, piped and troughed for water quality and environmental reasons but currently the cost is prohibitive.
The challenges that both Max and Pam see is surviving on the farm in their current situation and surviving the high operating costs. For the farm to be successful an essential ingredient is a strong relationship with your partner. It was easier to borrow and earn money off the land when they first started farming. Not wanting to sound negative, Max would not like to be doing it again. Pam says of him that he never wants to be anywhere else, but if he didn't have to work so hard they may be able to achieve a balance in their lives. There was far more time for enjoying themselves in their earlier days; Sundays would be taken up with seeing family and friends with time to swim in the river with the children.
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