September 2nd, 2023Good life down on the woollen mill farm

Words and images: Eve Lamb

It’s a job many would envy and Creswick Woollen Mill’s Farmer Maddy says it’s one she’s not about to swap for a desk any day soon.
Maddy Viola – also known as Farmer Maddy when she’s at work – is one of two farmers at the Creswick Woollen Mills on site demo farm, the other being local resident, Lyn Wozny who is also a shearer.
Besides tending to all the basic needs and creature comforts of their four-hooved charges, Maddy’s and Lyn’s job is to talk all day long about one of their all time favourite topics – the critters in their care.
“It’s fun. I get to hang out with the animals all day and provide information about them – their names, their ages, their breeds,” Maddy says.
“It makes a lot of people happy, especially the little kids.”
The Creswick Woollen Mill, famed for its beautiful fibre products including fine alpaca and merino fleece luxury items, has been operating at Creswick for more than 75 years now, becoming an important tourism drawcard.
But the global COVID pandemic had an impact, with a significant drop particularly in the number of Chinese and other Asian visitors, who up to then had been visiting the Creswick attraction in droves. They’d often come in coach-loads after visiting Ballarat’s Sovereign Hill with the Creswick Woollen Mill a must-do on their Aussie itinerary.
“Before COVID we used to have hundreds of internationals every day, and yes they’re slowly starting to come back now,” Creswick Woollen Mill store manager Cassandra Ellis says.
She says that now the pandemic is over they’ve also been able to start bringing the animals back to the site, something that’s only happened over the last few months, although not quite to the same levels as pre-COVID.
“Pre-COVID we had forty-plus alpacas here and crias (baby alpacas) being born here,” Cassandra said.
Alpaca shearing demonstrations took place twice a year on the especially built demonstration stage, prior to the pandemic, and now, Cassandra says, management thoughts are once again turning to bringing these back as well.
“There’s a lot for love for the animals,” she says. “They’re all super-stars. People come up from Melbourne to learn about them.”

The animals at the Mill farm now include adorable seven month old chocolate male alpacas – Choc and Chip – whose very apt names are the result of a recently concluded naming competition.
There’s also full-gown alpacas – Solomon who is a Suri alpaca and who sports a particularly cool fleece that would look right at home on the head of a surfer, and his best buddy, Juicy Bear, who is a Huacaya breed alpaca.
Then there’s Babar the sheep and his mate Shawn the sheep who has just celebrated a birthday in style. In fact, Farmer Maddy and Cassandra say all of the animals get to have their birthdays properly celebrated with cakes especially prepared to their personal taste – think something along the lines of a tasty mixture of specialty pellets and lucern chaff.
Maddy says getting to know the unique personalities and character traits of the animals in her care is part of what she most enjoys about her work.
“Shawn is like a teenager. Every now and then he has temper tantrums and tries to head-butt me. Juicy bear and Solomon have brotherly fights over food. But they all love each other,” she says.
There’s also the super pretty little multicoloured Persian Cross Dorper lambs, Bill and Ted and, as of very recent weeks, two special new additions – rare Valais Blacknose lambs Milo and Timmy who have beautiful white fleece with charming black point markings.
Sometimes known as “the cutest sheep in the world,” the Valais Blacknose breed originates from the Swiss Valais region and there are still very few of them in Australia.
“Milo and Timmy are rare Valais lambs from the Alpine region and the breed is new to Australia,” Cassandra says.

Maddy, who also works on a local horse property, says chatting to children and educating people about the animals is a really rewarding aspect of her work at the woollen mill farm.
“I could never sit down for a whole day at a desk,” she says.
The farm at Creswick Woollen Mill is open to the public to visit, see the animals and chat to Farmer Maddy or Farmer Lyn, five days a week, Thursday-Monday from 11am-3pm.