Wilyun Pools celebrated at Landcare Awards

Sylvia Leighton and Peter McKenzie were recently awarded the Australian Government Landcare Farming Award for their regenerative farming property Wilyun Pools.

Together they have dedicated themselves to integrating sustainable agriculture and land management with native revegetation, adopting the three pillars of Landcare: healthy environment, healthy society and health economy. They believe in taking actions to increase their own and rural communities’ societal wellbeing and are concerned about the loss of populations in rural areas brought on by the amalgamation of properties.

Sylvia is a botanist, dedicated conservationist and land management educator. In here role as a TAFE lecturer and community leader of workshops and field trips, she also serves as a mentor for scores of young people starting their careers in land management and farming. Peter has a farm forestry and agriculture background and has worked with farmers across the region promoting integrated farm forestry.

At Wilyun Pools and in partnership with Carbon Neutral they’re undertaking a large-scale restoration program creating thriving wildlife corridors in a Global Biodiversity Hotspot. Their efforts are counteracting land degradation and the rising groundwater table, making the land more sustainable for future generations.

You can support Wilyun Pools through our Plant-a-Tree program.

Read our extended story and conversation with Sylvia and Peter here.

“It has been lovely to receive an award and if it helps promote regenerative agricultural philosophies and caring for the land and wildlife corridors and integrating wildlife management into your commercial farming system, then that’s fantastic.”

Sylvia Leighton

It was a surprise! We’re still sort of coming to terms with it. We do what we do because it’s what we believe in, and we believe it’s really important. Receiving recognition is lovely and it’s a pat on the back. We don’t do it for those reasons of course, but it has been nice and a lot of people have congratulated us in the last week, and each time we sort of contemplate that and go ‘maybe our message is getting out there’.”

Peter McKenzie

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