Atkins Farm at Meadows has seen four generations of change, transitioning from dairy cows to potatoes to sheep.
Now its latest evolution is a bold and radiant symbol of happiness, warmth and resilience – the sunflower.
Tim and Monika McArthur are the latest generation running the family farm, which has welcomed hundreds of visitors every summer since 2021 to bask in the field of golden yellow blooms.
The McArthurs reimagined the future of the property by diversifying its offerings and developing an agri-tourism venture, allowing visitors to enjoy a ‘pick your own sunflowers’ experience. This year has been the McArthur family’s busiest season so far for their sunflower enterprise, with scores of visitors wandering the field with their secateurs and smartphones or camera equipment in hand.
“It’s a very picturesque backdrop, especially early in the morning and during golden hour in the evening,” Monika says.
“Lots of people are taking photos either with their friends or family or some people come by themselves as they might have a passion for photography and they’re taking photos of the flowers and the bees and the lady beetles.
“We’ve seen visitor numbers grow each year and some people come back annually to visit us which is amazing.”
Tim and Monika both have backgrounds working in corporate environments, but moved back to the Adelaide Hills about a decade ago.
Their idea to branch out into a visitor experience was born during the height of Covid-19.
The couple began brainstorming different uses for the farm as well as ways to bring people together outdoors at a time when social distancing was of prime importance.
“I guess it (the idea) came out of pandemic times, we were really getting into gardening and growing flowers here when we started discussing the idea of doing a bit of a test run with a paddock of sunflowers,” Monika says.
“We bought a bag of seed and we thought we’d just give it a go and see where we’d land and that field grew, which was amazing.
“We just opened up for friends and family to come pick some flowers.
“It was a nice, safe outdoor activity with social distancing so people felt comfortable and it was a way for us to catch up with everyone.
“We had been thinking about potentially opening up to the public to see if anyone would be interested in coming to pick flowers.
“It’s sort of taken off from there and this is now our fourth season.”
Atkins Farm traces its roots back to the 1920s when Tim’s grandfather, Hastings (Bill) Atkins, relocated from a sheep station near Broken Hill to the Meadows property, originally known as Yarrowee.
“A few generations have now lived and worked on the farm,” Monika says.
“It’s a much smaller footprint now than it used to be.
“Now it’s only 50 acres, but originally when Bill was here it was about 120.”
Bill farmed the land up until the age of 97 and over the years sheep, potatoes and dairy cows were the commodities.
But just like all farming ventures, the sunflower too has its challenges. The large colourful bloom is largely dependent on the weather and related growing conditions such as adequate rainfall.
“We don’t irrigate, we just rely on Mother Nature to water,” Monika says.
“This season we had a dry December, so the conditions were challenging in terms of growing.
“We lost a couple of fields, the seed either didn’t take because there wasn’t enough water or some seed didn’t germinate.
“But we have still managed to grow flowers, so I guess that’s the joys of farming.”
The fruit of the McArthurs’ labour is only evident once a year, during summer when the field blooms into a meadow of radiant yellow.
The seedlings are planted in spring and take three months to bloom.
Some seasons the ‘pick your own experience’ is only operational for two weeks of the year, four at the most as the sunflowers have a relatively short lifespan.
A sure sign of a season’s success is the width of the sunflower and the length of its sturdy stalk.
In good years, flowers at Atkins Farm have reached heights of two metres and widths likened to the size of dinner plates.
“When you see sunflowers en masse, it’s quite an amazing sight,” Monika says.
