From Mangoes to Aromatics
Mango Valley Farm is a 3.68-hectare family-run farm in Pine Creek, Bundaberg, Queensland.
More than 30 years ago, the property was part of a region well known for Kensington Pride mangoes, with more than 800 mango trees growing here at its peak.
When we took over the farm in 2022, we wanted to create something different — a small, productive farm built around natural growing, careful land management and a love of aromatic plants.
Today, Holy Basil (Tulsi) is at the heart of our farm, growing amongst the old mango trees.
Growing with Nature
We don't use synthetic pesticides or herbicides on our crops.
Instead, we focus on healthy soil, resilient plants and finding simple ways to work with nature.
We grow different plants together, observe how they respond to the seasons, and look for ways to solve problems without relying on chemical sprays.
For us, natural farming is not about following a perfect formula. It's about paying attention, trying things, and learning what works on our own land.
Making the Most of What the Farm Provides
One of our favourite parts of farming is finding new life for materials that might otherwise go to waste. We continuously build and enrich our soil by putting resources from around the farm to work in different ways.
- Raised Garden Beds
We upcycle old pallets and timber to build garden beds, filling the lower layers with cleared branches, cut reeds and weeds, then covering them with topsoil before planting vegetables and fruit.- In-Ground Growing Beds
Where we dig into the ground, we make use of the space below by filling it with branches, weeds and kitchen scraps before covering it again with soil and planting crops above.- Layered Grow Bags
We collect fallen leaves, weeds and small branches in growing bags, cover them with soil and use them to grow more plants.It’s a simple way of making the most of what we already have on the farm — using resources again, building better soil and wasting less.
Use what we have. Waste less. Grow more.
An Unexpected Discovery
When we first took over the farm, managing persistent weeds — especially tough rat-tail grass — was one of our biggest challenges.
Conventional advice was to use chemical herbicides, but we wanted to manage our land naturally, without synthetic sprays. So we chose a different path and began planting Holy Basil (Tulsi) between our mango trees.
Over the following seasons, we noticed something remarkable. After each cold, dry winter, weeds beneath our established Tulsi plants would naturally thin out and recede. The Tulsi, however, remained standing strong, with little weed regrowth around it.
We don’t claim to know exactly why this happens, and we have no scientific evidence to prove that Tulsi itself is responsible. It may simply be the result of natural plant competition, or there may be other factors at play.
But it is something we have observed repeatedly on our own farm over several years — and one of the many reasons we have come to appreciate this remarkable plant.
A Farm Still Growing
Today, Holy Basil (Tulsi) is at the heart of Mango Valley Farm and the products we make.
We harvest and process our Tulsi in small batches, creating tea, essential oils, powders, blends and aromatic products.
We also grow smaller crops including passionfruit, ginger, turmeric, lemongrass and tea tree, and we're always experimenting with what might grow well in our part of Bundaberg.
What started as a hobby farm has slowly become something more — a place to grow, experiment, reuse and learn.
We're still growing, and we're excited to see where the farm takes us next.
