Bobbie Sattler Bushland Reserve

In 1946, Gus and Bobbie Sattler and their young family settled at a Meridan Plains property in an area now known as Sattler Rd. Living conditions were quite primitive due to isolation, insufficient water, poor soil and rocky terrain. In the late 1940s the Sattlers' mail was delivered twice a week to their homestead from Landsborough Railway Station. Gus Sattler was born on June 21, 1906. At the age of nine he travelled by bullock wagon to Queensland. He caught his first swarm of bees at an early age. He cut many swarms of bees out of trees and kept them in empty petrol cases. In those days petrol came in large tins each holding four imperial gallons. These cases and tins provided pioneer families with walls for houses and, when flattened out, tin roofs. Gus and Bobbie Sattler started a honey business known as Sunshine Apiaries and were known for the delicious honey they produced. Gus became known as the "honey man". The stumps for their house went in on Armistice Day, 1946. Some of the material came from an Air Force hut near Toorbul Point. The weatherboards were cut on the farm from swamp mahogany; a timber discarded by many mills but valuable to the Sattler family. During Gus's lifetime he saw the wallum plains and tea tree forests between Noosa and Bribie gradually diminish due to urban and pastoral development. Gus became a great beekeeper respected for his knowledge of the Australian bush and its flora and fauna. Stella "Bobbie" Sattler was a much loved member of the Caloundra community. She became a member of Caloundra Wild Life Preservation Society and joined other environmentalists such as Isabel Jordan, Stan Tutt and Kathleen McArthur as they challenged development trying to save the wallum country and the wildflowers that grew in abundance. Bobbie ran the Sunshine Apiaries shop on their property. Initially the Sattlers got two pence a pound for their honey. Gus and Bobbie were the first to market honey by identifying the tree species the honey came from. Bobbie Sattler inherited her mother's 70-year-old sulphur-crested cockatoo Cockie. The bird was well known and knew many words. His fate was nearly sealed one New Year's Eve when the family heard Cockie yelling out. They found a large carpet snake in his cage. It was obvious the snake and the cockatoo had been fighting as his feathers lay in the cage. After that Cockie would yell out "Snake, Gus", which became a source of amusement for honey customers. The Sattlers drew three parcels of land when they moved to Meridan Plains. Fifty-eight years later Bobbie Sattler dedicated most of her block of nearly 40 hectares off Pierce Ave, Little Mountain as a nature reserve. This is now the Bobbie Sattler Bushland Reserve, which is a beautiful diverse area of coastal forest and wallum country. Bobbie Sattler died on October 29, 2006 and is buried near her husband, who died in 1992, at Mooloolah Cemetery.