Their 370ha property near Riverton enjoyed excellent shelter for its 5000 stock units, with almost every paddock bordered by treelines. But the October 23 windstorm came at a huge cost: hundreds of trees were brought down, many planted by Mr Black’s grandfather a century ago, and others he remembers planting as a boy.
Mr Black estimates they now face clearing 400 to 500 fallen trees, with another 150 to 200 likely needing to be felled. The first pines went in when his grandfather bought the farm in 1926, and the tradition was continued by his father and now Mr Black, who plants about 400-500 trees annually.
"Shelter is absolutely critical to stock welfare," he said.
"On a hot day or a miserable cold one, they’re always in around the trees."
Now those same belts have suffered unprecedented damage. Only three of their 28 paddocks closest to the house were left stock-proof after the storm.
Many of the older belts, established in the 1920s, had been side-trimmed regularly but never topped.
"We believed that for every metre of height, you got 10m of shelter and shade, but those big granddaddy trees didn’t stand a chance in that wind."
Blackdale has a mix of species in its shelter plantations, and some held on better than others. Faster-growing pines, green Leylandii and macrocarpas proved particularly vulnerable, their less-established root systems unable to withstand what Mr Black described as "a river of wind". Species like golden Leylandii, poplars and eucalypts appeared to handle the wind a lot better and the younger shelter belts that had been regularly topped also had a lot less damage.
Mr Black plans to continue planting the faster-growing breeds but will now run a regular topping programme. The sturdier species will also remain part of his planting mix.
"It’s hard to know how many we have lost until we clean the trees up".
There will be no insurance payout for tree loss, destroyed fences — spanning "tens of kilometres" — or dead stock.
"I’ve given myself 12 months to get things tidied up," he said. While grateful for community offers of help, the scale of damage makes most of the work too dangerous for volunteers.
"It’s a bit of a war zone. We need big machines to deal with these trees — they’re too big and dangerous for people with chainsaws."
Although there will eventually be plenty of firewood to sell, he expects that income will be minor compared with the overall recovery cost, which could reach $400,000 or more.
Mr Black said support from the Rural Support Trust had been invaluable.
"They sorted us a generator so we could get the pump going for stock water. It got shared around all the freezers — every four hours my father would shift it to another one."
In the chaos, a few things were inevitably lost.
"We’d been tailing a few mobs and I still had 2700 doses of Scabine in the fridge, which went off."
Insurance would cover that loss, "but that’s about it".
