Wimmera farmers continue clean up after Poolaijelo fire

Scorched trees and shrubs around the immediate perimeter of their home are a reminder of how different the outcome could have been if the local fire brigade had not dampened the house in the moments before the grassfire crossed onto their property.

The quick-thinking action of the Poolaijelo locals, including Mr Frost, a former fire captain of the brigade who was driving the fire tanker at the time, ultimately saved the home from radiant heat and ember attack and the place his soldier-settler father once lived.

Further afield, charred paddocks can be seen for kilometres, as can dozens of several-hundred-year-old iconic red gums which lay strewn across the ground, felled naturally during the fires or after the incident due to integrity concerns.

Piles of fence wire remain bundled up in paddocks, while heavy machinery work to clear fence lines after the biggest fire in the Wimmera in more than 50 years.

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The farming community of Poolaijelo is located 10 kilometres as the crow flies from the SA border.

Sparked by a car in SA at 1.30pm on December 31, within two days, more than 7300 hectares had burned as the death toll of livestock soared into the thousands.

Most of the damage was done on the Victorian side of the border, and mainly on farming properties around the Poolaijelo community.

Both of the Frosts' properties, including their 280-hectare home block and their 136ha property several kilometres away, were completely burnt.

Six-hundred of their first-cross ewes, 15 Dorset and White Suffolk rams and three Angus bulls perished in the fire, along with a machinery shed and kilometres of fencing.

Mrs Frost is also a former captain of the brigade and protected the house as the fire approached.

"Things are starting to come together and coming home yesterday we found a cow and four heifers... they were coming home too, and it's been over two weeks since we'd seen them," she said.

"It was hard to believe."

A neighbour had earlier opened a gate to allow the cattle to escape as the fire approached their farm, ultimately saving their lives.

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Reignition of red gums has kept volunteer firies busy since the fires were put out, and Mrs Frost says, since the start of the year, there has been a call out every second day.

"We don't have fully-contained fences at the moment, so our sheep keep wandering out of their paddocks," she said.

"We thought by feeding them they might want to stay, but that's not really the case.

"You get a great sense of achievement when at the end of the day you look at, for instance, the fence line you've pulled down or pulling a shed apart and saying, 'that's one less job'."

She remains somewhat optimistic, however, and despite missing out on celebrating the new year, she said a celebration was well overdue.

"After the fires we also celebrated our 50^th wedding anniversary so some time in the very near future we're going to sit down and have a new year's and wedding bash with cashews and macadamias," she said.

"If we don't move forward, we'll go mad so you have to do the best you can to get on with it."

On a neighbouring property, Peter Ker manages mixed farming enterprise Karowarra which lost 125 ewes and lambs and three spring-drop calves, along with 30 kilometres of fencing on its 890ha Poolaijelo property, Caranta.

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But Mr Ker says he is upbeat and has focused on the positives of the fire.

"First up, we had to get the right people in there to help with the clean up and removal of fences," he said.

"Then we had to get fencing contractors back in to start the job and since the fires, we've replaced eight or nine kilometres of fencing.

"It's like adding a $350,000 project and we've got to get it done as quickly as possible, and that's in the midst of finishing harvest this week and baling lucerne hay on our irrigation on Monday and we're also drafting up steers for our autumn sale and have only just finished shearing at Caranta as well."

Karowarra's portfolio includes four properties, two in Victoria and two in SA.

Fifty per cent of its Poolaijelo property was burnt during the fire and Mr Ker said with the loss of hay and cost of agistment, the fire would cost the business close to $400,000.

Marjorie Todd has lived in Poolaijelo since birth, with a family history in the area that stretches back until her great-grandfather.

Mrs Todd lives on one of the properties devastated by the fire, called Matapara, since 1961.

In all her time in Poolaijelo, she only recalls one fire, in 1955, inflicting as much damage to farms as the New Year's Eve fire.

She said she and her family were in Beachport to celebrate New Year's Eve when they received a call from a concerned neighbour.

"Our neighbor phoned and said 'you'd better get home, there is a fire heading straight to your place'," she said.

"I thought what do you do? You don't panic, it is dangerous if you panic. I phoned our sons and they said they were on their way. They sped home as quickly as they could and got home before us."

When Mrs Todd arrived back in Poolaijelo, she and her neighbour had assumed their house was gone, with the fire sweeping across most of the property.

"The trees were still roaring down the side of our track, so we got in his (neighbour's) ute and headed across the paddock," she said.

"It was such a relief to see a green tree, and then more green trees.

"We drove into our gateway and there was a friend of our son standing with a hose in his hand. I have to say, he really risked his life to get here, and he saved our house."

In all, Mrs Todd estimates less than 100 acres of their property was untouched by the blaze.

Her sons, both farmers, were also devastated by the fire - both lost 1000s of sheep and a woolshed.

"I have a three-acre garden and I have English Trees and natives in the garden. I don't have any of them near the house, I only have English trees near the house.

"It is not by accident, I built my garden for the 56 years we have been married and that was always to be planned as the fire break."

In the two weeks following the fire Mrs Todd said the support - both at home and from afar, had been phenomenal.

"We have been absolutely overwhelmed by the generosity of people. We have had friends come from Geelong and Port Fairy to come and support us. The support locally has just been amazing," she said.

"If you look after people they look after you when the chips are down. The food that has come has just been overwhelming. We all have freezers full of food.

"We all have our homes and nobody was hurt which is the main thing."

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