One after the other, market goers stop, get out their phones, and ask if they can take a photo. “It’s so beautiful,” someone gasps.
The stall that’s caught their attention is Kenrick Riley and Maree Bracker’s Wiccawood Organics, known for its diverse, unusual and immaculately presented selection of herbs, vegetables and edible flowers. “Maree and I both have the philosophy that if you’re going to go to the party, you dress up,” explains Kenrick.
It also helps that Maree is an artist, and there is no doubt that her artistic flair has a lot to do with the appeal of the Wiccawood stall.
Their colourful, vibrant and nutritious produce is all grown on their small organic farm at Georgica, near Nimbin, which Kenrick and Maree bought as a neglected piece of land in the late 90s.
They have spent the past 20 years improving the soil and using organic, biodynamic and permaculture principles to create a productive and healthy market garden.
They have a focus on Asian herbs and vegetables, like galangal, kaffir lime, chilli, lemongrass and Asian greens, which Maree and Kenrick were first introduced to when they lived in Brisbane many years ago.
“We were living in West End, which was renowned back in those days for a lot of Asian foods… and we were introduced to a whole lot of new flavours,” said Kenrick. They began growing these crops in their backyard veggie garden, found that they thrived in the sub tropical climate, and then brought them along when they made the move to Georgica and full time farming.
Customers at the markets have introduced other crops – the leafy green edible, aibika, for example, was give to Kenrick and Maree as a cutting by a customer at Byron Bay. Over the years, it has become one of their main summer crops: “It’s very high in protein, and a lot of people around here don’t eat meat, so we have a lot of people that come and seek it out,” said Kenrick.
Brought up on a sheep station that was ‘dripping’ with chemicals, Kenrick says organic is the only way he would ever farm.
“You don’t have to wear a space suit because you’re spraying poisons all around the place, and also, you get to learn that as your soils get better, your plants get stronger, and they don’t get eaten as much by bugs anymore.
“ My customers are happy to have a few holes chewed in leaves here and there, and I’m happy that my customers are getting food that they know has only been sprayed with water.”
Find Wiccawood Organics at the Mullumbimby Farmers Market every Friday.
Story and pic by Kate O’Neill
