2nd - this short story won second prize in the Society’s 2026 Geography Writing Competition. The Competition’s theme in 2026 was “Changing Environments in Queensland”.

Jenny Woolsey - The Old Pineapple Farm

2019

This afternoon begins like any other. I pull on my socks and worn sneakers, lock the front door and head down the hill. My mind, once crowded with heavy thoughts, is beginning to soften with this prescribed exercise. Each day, I follow the same, familiar loop: along the creek, over the footbridge, skirt the shopping centre, puff up the hill to the traffic lights then turn left along the front of the pineapple farm before the final right turn at the church and back home.

I pause at Four Mile Creek. Today, the water is green and tranquil, holding the shadows like secrets. A fallen tree kisses the water and ducks drift lazily around it, unhurried. I’ve seen this creek in all its moods—sometimes swollen with rain, boiling over like a pot on the stove, other times shrivelled and cracked like an old leather boot left in the sun.

My second stop is the farm: the first one established in the area and the last to remain. Row upon row of grey-green spiky plants stretch across the paddocks, each one destined to bear a sweet, juicy golden pineapple. It feels like an anomaly here, surrounded by asphalt, roaring trucks, blaring sirens and the hard edges of suburbia. As a lover of pineapples, I delight in spotting the first hints of flower stalks, watching the bees buzz over the pinkish-purple blooms and witnessing the quiet magic of fruit swelling in the rosettes, changing from green to yellow and orange.

This farm belongs to the Blatchford family. Percy and Lily bought the land in 1937 and their son Leslie carried their legacy forward. For thirty years, I’ve watched Leslie plough, water and harvest - steadfast, season after season.  I heard he passed recently.

A large, glossy property development sign catches my attention. Its wooden stakes are hammered into the fertile soil. This wasn’t here yesterday. It advertises The Landing; 106 housing lots and 76 townhouses built on 15 hectares. The farm’s been sold!

My heart sinks. I stare at the Blatchford’s sprawling, white Queenslander set back from the road, embraced by weathered wooden sheds. What stories are contained in this house? What lessons could it tell us about the land and the people who tended it?

It’s not long and the construction fencing is erected, the farmhouse hauled away and the pineapple plants torn from the earth. 

2022

Three years on, no trace of the Strathpine farm remains except for the pineapple-shaped playground and street names that nod politely to the family.

2025

I still pull on my socks and sneakers and take my walk each afternoon. My mind is no longer depressed. I pause at the creek to soak in its serenity. A sunning water dragon scurries into the long grass. Then, on my final leg, I take a moment at The Landing to remember the old pineapple farm that once thrived here and the family who tended it with love and devotion.