The Titmans at Samford Valley

Kelly & Grant Titman – Food, Community, and Landscape Restoration on the Urban Fringe

The Titmans at Samford Valley

Our fifth Natural Sequence Farming Champion story takes us somewhere a little different.

Not to a large property on the tablelands. Not to a vast property in outback Queensland. But to 43 acres in the Samford Valley — surrounded by houses, sitting on the fringe of one of Australia's most populated cities, and quietly doing some of the most meaningful regenerative work in South East Queensland.

Kelly and Grant Titman moved to Samford Valley with a clear intention: grow their own food and regenerate the landscape. What they've built since is something far bigger than either of them anticipated.

Protecting What's Left

The Samford Valley is changing. Houses are creeping in. Land is being subdivided. And the pockets of open agricultural land that remain are becoming increasingly rare.

Grant and Kelly saw that clearly when they arrived.

"What we didn't want was to see this pocket - one of the last few pockets of land in the valley - broken up and subdivided", Grant explains.

So they made a decision. This property would be multigenerational. It would outlive them. It would educate them. And it would hopefully educate the community around them.

That's not just a land management decision. That's a values decision. And it shapes everything they do.

Reading the Landscape

They arrived with enthusiasm, good intentions, and the kind of fresh eyes that can sometimes see what experienced farmers miss.

One of the most powerful shifts for Grant has been learning to read the landscape before acting on it.

"The one thing about coming not from a farming background is seeing every plant's doing a job," he says. "Whereas previously you come from an urban background where you mow your grass, and you have it all perfect… but just now experiencing landscapes and seeing things - teaching gives me an opportunity to go, okay, let's just calm the farm for a second. Look at what's happening before I just pull things out and cut things down."

This is a shift that takes time. It requires patience, observation, and a willingness to let go of the urge to control. But it's foundational to Natural Sequence Farming, and it's one of the most important things a new land manager can learn.

Contours, Cattle, and the Water Cycle

The practical work at Samford Valley is built around contours.

Contours carved across the landscape have created the structure for everything else. Electric fencing runs on either side of those contours. Trees have been planted on the downside. And the cattle — rather than being confined to static paddocks — follow the contours through the landscape.

"They basically follow the contours through the landscape. So they move a bit like snakes through the landscape," Kelly explains.

This approach has opened up parts of the property that would otherwise have been difficult to fence and manage. It's allowed the fertility to change. It's restored the water cycle. And it's created the conditions for trees, food plants, and fruit to establish across the landscape over time.

The goal, as Kelly puts it, is to "have an abundance of food and fruit for us in the landscape and let nature kind of tell us what she needs."

That's not a passive approach. It's an active, observant, and deeply intentional one.

The Urban Fringe Opportunity

Here's what makes the Titman's story genuinely unique in this series.

Samford Valley is not remote. It's not isolated. It's on the doorstep of Brisbane — and that proximity to a major urban population is something Grant and Kelly have come to see not as a limitation, but as an extraordinary opportunity.

"I think given where we are, it took us a little bit of time to recognise that this is a very urban landscape and so we do have an opportunity to sit on the fringe and be accessible for the city folk to come and understand where their food does come from”, Kelly reflects.

And the need is real.

Kelly grew up on a farm. She understood from a young age where food came from. But listening to children at the schools their own kids attend, she's encountered something that stopped him in his tracks — kids who genuinely believe meat comes from a supermarket, not from an animal.

"That great disconnect means that we have an agritourism opportunity or an educational platform that we can have children easily get access to," she says.

This isn't just about running farm tours. It's about something more fundamental — helping a generation of young Australians begin to understand the chain that connects soil to plant to animal to food. And understanding that if you want healthy food, you need healthy animals. If you want healthy animals, you need healthy plants. And if you want healthy plants, you need healthy soil.

"If they can begin to understand little parts of that at a young age, then I'd be really hopeful that there'll be more people that want to understand how to grow food in backyards and tubs — and hopefully take as much of the community along for the ride as we can."

A Multigenerational Vision

What Grant and Kelly are building at Samford Valley isn't just a regenerative farm. It's a multigenerational asset — for their family, for their community, and for the landscape itself.

They're protecting one of the last open pockets in the valley from subdivision. They're restoring the water cycle and rebuilding soil fertility using Natural Sequence Farming principles. They're growing food and creating the conditions for an abundance of fruit and plants to establish over time. And they're opening their gates to a community that desperately needs to reconnect with where food actually comes from.

In a valley on the fringe of a city, they're proving that regenerative agriculture isn't just for remote properties and broad-acre farms.

It's for here. It's for now. And it's for everyone.

👉 Watch Kelly and Grant's full story here: https://youtu.be/SpHSuPtVym8

Peter Andrews OAM spent his life showing people that there's a better way to work with the landscape. This story continues that mission — proof that the work is happening, right now, even on the urban fringe of Brisbane.

Let's Rehydrate Australia — together.

We'd love to hear your thoughts after you watch Kelly and Grant's story. Comment below and let us know what resonates with you.

P.S. If you know someone on the urban fringe, someone with a small acreage who's wondering whether Natural Sequence Farming applies to them, please share this story. 43 acres surrounded by houses in the Samford Valley is proof that it does.

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⛰️ Take the next steps to restore your landscape with our on-ground Learn Natural Sequence Farming course, or add your name to the waitlist for our upcoming online course.

This is the fifth story in our Rehydrate Australia series, sharing the journeys of farmers and land managers implementing Natural Sequence Farming across Australia.