LOCKHART woman Elissa Strong was born with a green thumb.
Her love for gardening grew from a young age as she watched her mother Mandy and grandmothers Jill Strong, Lockhart, and the late Helen Scott, formerly of Boree Creek, tend to their gardens on their farms during her childhood.
“My mum and her mum both have extensive typical country cottage gardens while my dad’s mum’s garden was more focused on native plants, vegetables and fruit trees,” Elissa said.
“Growing up I spent a lot of time in the yard and it fostered a general love of all things gardening.
“One of my earliest memories is potting up geraniums with my great grandmother and being really excited when the cuttings would flower.”
Elissa’s interest in watching plants and flowers flourish began to go beyond the backyard garden as she took an interest in sowing plants on a much larger scale.
This led to her developing another passion – agronomy – a field she has worked in for the past seven years with Delta Agribusiness.
Her career was inspired by her involvement in her family’s cropping property “Wargam”, from a young age.
“It was all hands on deck on the farm and myself and my three siblings were all involved,” Elissa said.
“Dad (Lynton Strong) used to pay us one cent per Bathurst burr we’d chip in the summer – my brother Toby and I used to get up at 5am to beat the heat during the summer holidays, and if we had $40 by the time we went back to school, we were stoked.”
As she grew older, sowing and harvest time were particularly interesting for Elissa.
“I did 10 harvests of header driving – the best job in the paddock – from Year 11 through to just recently when I took on a role as a grain marketer and couldn’t take the time off work anymore,” she said.
Having spent the past seven years establishing her agronomy career, last year Elissa took on a new challenge.
Her dream of one day having a nursery came to life when in April 2013 she purchased 400 varieties of irises and daylilies from what was formerly Bolong Farms Iris Farm.
In 10 days, more than 20,000 plants were transported in wheat bags from their previous home between The Rock and Uranquinty to establish the nursery in her own backyard.
And Sunshine Iris Nursery was born.
“Sunshine gates and the old Sunshine harvesters played a big part in the early history of farming in our area so that influenced the name change,” Elissa said.
Eighteen months on, a field of irises now flower at the entrance of “Quamby”, where Elissa and her partner Sandy Day live between Lockhart and Boree Creek.
The pair run a 2220-hectare all-cropping operation, but adding the flowers to their home has given Elissa her touch on the farm.
“It’s always been a dream of mine to have a business that’s an extension of both my garden and the farm,” she said.
“I was looking for something that could be mine on the property and I had a head start with looking after the irises with my agronomy skills – the same principle applies to growing crops as it does to flowers with getting the soil right and that sort of thing.”
The plants now at “Quamby” have a long history in the Riverina and had four former homes before Lockhart.
“The irises I now own were first established some time in the early ‘90s at Lavington, and have been transported to Jindera, Henty and then to The Rock, as the nursery changed hands many times,” she said.
“There’s a lot of history there and it will be exciting to watch them grow at home.
“Although we already have about 300 varieties of iris we don’t have many that were bred in the past five years so we’re looking to focus on improving this in the near future.
“Breeding new varieties isn’t on the list at the moment, but never say never.”
In 12 months of selling the irises via her online store, more than 400 orders have been shipped Australia-wide.
Using social media and her website Elissa sells the flowers year round bar September and October when they’re flowering.
“It’s ideal for me because we live in a remote area and not much traffic goes past the front gate,” she said.
“I like to think that being a bit younger we have an edge on the technology side of the nursery business and having the whole range available online. I look at it as an extension of my garden, and another part of diversifying the farm.”
While yet to take an order from the Northern Territory, Sunshine Iris Nursery has delivered to all other States.
“Most of the orders go to NSW and Victoria because that’s where the flowers grow best,” Elissa said.
“I’m very lucky I have mum who helps a lot with the packing of the orders and the weeding, and Sandy helped to install the irrigation system and the beds.”
“They seem to flower better each year as they become established.”
“We can’t wait until next year.”
Find Sunshine Iris Nursery on Facebook for more information or visit www.sunshineiris.com.au or contact 0429 857 085.