We're gathering on the land of the Muwinina people,
the Big River people,
land that has been cared for
and sustained Aboriginal people for 150,000 years.
Every day, we touch the morning and say,
"We are honouring our ancestors.
"We're honouring those that have walked this land before us,"
this beautiful island that is like a sanctuary for us, yeah.
So...welcome.
My name's Kris Schaffer.
I've had the privilege of building this garden,
working with nature here, at Neika,
and 'Neika', which means 'mountain' or 'hill' in the Aboriginal language.
Where we are now is above the snowline, so...
..140 metres above sea level,
so you've got that lovely cool wet forest atmosphere.
In the late 1800s, this was all cleared, so...
..this was grazed by horses and donkeys.
It was degraded, forgotten pasture land.
I've got small acreage now where I built my house
out of celery top pine, back in the early '80s.
When I first acquired the land,
I realised that I needed to grow a lot of plants.
So to actually learn to propagate was critical
to having so much open, degraded land.
I really wanted to extend that knowledge further, so...
..studying horticulture was that next step.
Also, I was part of the Australian Plants Society,
and that was a critical way
of learning how to propagate and grow
the more difficult Australian plants.
When I first started the garden here,
there were some climbing blueberries, Billardiera longiflora, growing.
The Billardiera has been the first iconic bush food
that I started propagating and growing.
I've grown it to the point where I've had six kilo in my first big harvest.
That's led on to being more and more specialist in bush foods,
so bush foods have been my... yeah, my passion.
I'm part of a national Aboriginal women's Bushfood Alliance
that ensures that we, as women, continue to work on country
through the collecting and the cultivating
and the cooking and eating of bush foods.
When I was looking at creating the garden,
I was aware that I wanted to have those species of plants
that were best suited to this spot.
These plants were put on the...the bare soil,
so it was just a paddock of clay, nothingness,
and the Richea dracophyllas have...have grown beautifully
without any extra care,
so perfect environment.
The Richea dracophylla is indigenous to this area,
grows at this altitude
and is an iconic plant of eastern Tasmania.
This is Richea pandanifolia, otherwise known as pandani.
Iconic Tasmanian endemic.
I grew this from seed 30 years ago,
and each successive year of flowering,
there's bright red flowers under the leaves.
Will live to hundreds of years if protected from fire.
I've planted species that have attracted the birds, especially -
Banksia marginata.
Got Banksia serrata as well.
The banksia is there for our manganas,
the black cockatoos, flying in.
The legacy of this garden is letting nature do her thing,
but those plants that belong here, if we can bring them into cultivation
so that we can secure that, that's left in the wild,
this is a demonstration of that.
I've now got it so that it's just purely for the wildlife,
so for the bettongs, the bandicoots, the potoroos,
the pademelons, so...
..it's been a lovely combination of building the garden
and working with nature.
I believe it's using those Aboriginal, those Indigenous,
land management practices in the process of gardening
that has made it so beautiful, actually.