PIP COURTNEY, PRESENTER: An unlikely partnership has formed on Kangaroo Island in South Australia between one of the country’s most exclusive resorts and a small rural school. And while it may seem like a fish out of water, it’s all to do with a species more at home in the Tropics: the barramundi. Kerry Staight reports on a student aquaculture program feeding some very big fish.
KERRY STAIGHT, REPORTER: It’s the million-dollar view guests at the exclusive Southern Ocean Lodge on Kangaroo Island come for. But when you’re forking out more than $1,000 a night, the food has to live up to the five-star backdrop. Most of the produce served here is sourced locally. The big difference with this fish is the producers behind it are school kids.
JOHN HIRD, SOUTHERN OCEAN LODGE MANAGER: I’ve worked all over the world and I’ve seen various things in education, but when I came to – went to the school at Pandana, I walked away from that and then said, “Every school should be like this.”
KERRY STAIGHT: A world away from the luxury lodge, although in reality just over an hour’s drive inland, is the small town of Pandana and its school of around 150 students. The college was set up after the Second World War to educate children of soldier settlers. Here, primary industries and education go hand-in-hand from an early age, making it one of the oldest agricultural schools in the country. And as the island’s farmers have diversified, so too has the school curriculum.
BARB COOPER, AGRICULTURE TEACHER: When there was the downturn in wool in the early-’80s when everyone thought that they were going to lose their farms, they decided to diversify and they diversified in lots of different ways and one of them was aquaculture, land-based aquaculture and they started Maran farms, lots of Maran farms. Not many exist now. And the then teacher decided he wouldn’t mind a couple of tanks, so he was just going to set it all up and he wanted about $5,000, so he put in for a grant and the Government said at that time they were building skill centres all round Australia and they said, “Would you like $250,000?”
KERRY STAIGHT: Suddenly, a small idea for the classroom turned into a special aquaculture centre with half a dozen tanks, and for these kids, the first lesson of the day is to feed what’s in them. While the school considered diversifying into Maran like the local farming community, in the end, it opted for a fin fish.
BARB COOPER: The kids found that barramundi were the most robust. They produce in a school year, you can get them from fingerlings, little ones, to plate size. They would cope with lots of people being around them and they weren’t too scary, so they weren’t going to hurt anyone.
KERRY STAIGHT: Barramundi is an Australian fish, but the tropical species is not native to Kangaroo Island and that was part of the attraction.
JARRAD KELLY, STUDENT: One of the reason that we actually chose barramundi is that if they did escape into the wild, they wouldn’t be able to survive, so then we wouldn’t be introducing new species into the waterway. And it just opens up a whole new area for fishing for me ’cause they’re a tropical species rather than a coldwater species like we have down on Kangaroo Island.
KERRY STAIGHT: Year 11 student Jarred Kelly has grown up on a wool property on Kangaroo Island, but he plans to set up a fishing charter business when he leaves school, so it’s no surprise this is his favourite classroom.
JARRAD KELLY: I just like fishing. You get to know the fish. There’ s one fish that’s in there that’s outsmarted all the rest of them, so he’ll just sit there when you feed it. The rest of them will grab it and makes a big splash and take off and – but this one rather just sits there and waits for the next one, so it’s learnt that the food is gonna be in the same spot.
KERRY STAIGHT: Understanding the behaviour of these fish is one of the most important exercises. After all, the students are handling a community of potential cannibals, so the barramundi have to be graded to stop them turning on each other.
JARRAD KELLY: They have a tendency of eating each other when they get to a certain size, so a fish of, say, 60 centimetres will eat something up to two-thirds of its size, so a 60 centimetre fish will eat a 40 centimetre fish. So, that’s quite a big fish. So you gotta get the big ones out and move them into the right-sized tank, otherwise you have problems there.
KERRY STAIGHT: As in any farming operation, there have been some harsh lessons along the way, and as is often the case, Mother Nature has been the unforgiving teacher.
BARB COOPER: I’ve sat in there overnight when the thunder and lightning are coming because when the power goes off the generator starts, but sometimes that all goes catastrophic and we’ve had nights in there trying to keep it all alive because the fish only last for about 10 minutes without being stressed and then 20 minutes, they’ll start dying. We’ve had a whole farm died overnight.
KERRY STAIGHT: But far from leading to its demise, the decade-old aquaculture program has now diversified into aquaponics. Nutrient-rich waste water from the fish farm is used to grow herbs and leafy vegetables.
BARB COOPER: I love the aquaponics. I think it’s the best thing. It’s such a fantastic use of a resource that used to be just dumped down the paddock.
KERRY STAIGHT: The students do more than harvest the greens. Just like with the barramundi farm, they’ve also had a big hand in designing this setup and it’s up to them to maintain it and help fix it when things go wrong.
PETER PHILP, CAMPUS PRINCIPAL: This is probably about phase three or four, which is working really, really well now, but it’s trial and error and the important thing is the students are involved in the trial and error, so they see that it is not about getting it right the first time.
KERRY STAIGHT: What’s in these tanks has also inspired a fresh approach to some of the more traditional school subjects like maths and science.
PETER PHILP: There’s a huge amount of chemistry in that for a start. There’s a huge amount of biology in there. There’s a huge amount of maths with data and statistics, graphing, tabling, growth rates, mortality rates – all those things. So there’s a huge scope for the traditional curriculum in there.
KERRY STAIGHT: The more hands-on approach to academia is certainly a hit with many of the students.
TANNER MORRIS, STUDENT: Practical learning is – I find that so much easier than assignments. Like, you’re doing assignments after but it’s easier to learn with practical things ’cause you can actually understand and see, like, what you’re doing and it’s funner to be out of the classroom than behind a door at a desk.
KERRY STAIGHT: Then there are the vocational skills the students pick up like gutting and filleting fish. Welcome additions to a high school certificate on an island with several seafood industries.
PETER PHILP: It really increases the pathways for students. It gives ’em real-life learning, real-life experience and it allows them to complete vocational education competencies that demand they do that real-life learning.
KERRY STAIGHT: Providing these extra pathways though does not come with a profit. While the school sells its fish and greens to the local community, Kangaroo Island only has a population of around 4,500, so there’s a limited number of buyers. Even its weekly supply of whole fish and herbs to Southern Ocean Lodge doesn’t push this program into the black.
PETER PHILP: It doesn’t run at a profit, but we try to keep that margin – we try to keep the costs down as low as possible. Maths doesn’t run as a profit in a school, does it? English doesn’t run as a profit. But we’ve got to make sure we get good learning outcomes.
KERRY STAIGHT: Peter Philp concedes at times the outcomes have not justified the costs and in the past there was talk of shutting the program down. But he says after a review and a revamp, the school has chosen to go the other way, investing in a food processing centre so the students can finish what they start.
PETER PHILP: The vision is to have that paddock-to-plate experience for tourists that come in. They’ll come in, the students will greet them, they’ll show them through and around the facility, all the facility, then they’ll come back, sit down and the students will serve up the product from our paddock onto their plate.
KERRY STAIGHT: Perhaps they could pick up a few tips from Jack Ingram. After working in one of Australia’s top restaurants, Melbourne’s Vue de monde, the chef is now in charge of keeping Southern Ocean Lodge’s wealthy and at times well-known guests satisfied. And whether it’s served raw, steamed or pan fried, he says the students’ barramundi has received the big tick of approval from both kitchen staff and customers.
JACK INGRAM, SOUTHERN OCEAN LODGE CHEF: They’re doing a excellent job. The quality is amazing. It’s as good a quality as anything I’ve seen. I mean, we get them one day after processing, so they are as fresh as the freshest fish you’ll see. And we really rate the barramundi.
JARRAD KELLY: To be able to get fish from a rural school like ours to one of the high-class restaurants/hotel, it’s quite impressive. We’re very proud of that.
2015 ABC