Western Plains Turf
It’s not the famed Western Plains Zoo we are talking about here, but another iconic local business. Located in the heart of NSW, Western Plains Turf (formerly known as Orana Turf) started from humble beginnings. Over the years, it steadily grew into a business that services all of Central and Western NSW. The original name Orana Turf, traces back to over 25 years in and around Dubbo and the Orana Region.
The business is owned and operated by father and son partnership Mick and Tim O’Neill.
Tim and his wife Simone live on the property with their four children – Milla, Sully, Ellie and Halle. Born and bred in Dubbo, Tim was fortunate enough to spend most of his childhood outside in the backyard playing football and cricket with his mates, on his parents’ lawn. Tim has been heavily involved in the Dubbo community through the years, attending St Johns Primary and College as well as being a proud member of the Dubbo community through his passion for rugby league.
The family were originally timber cutters, Mick was 4th and Tim was 5th generation. A lot of the state forests around the area became national parks making it a dying trade with sourcing timber getting harder and harder. The family were at a crossroads as to what they should do. Tim’s uncle had the Orana Turf business, but it was a small farm. There wasn’t enough work for the three of them, so Tim and Mick made the decision to take on the business and expand.
Established in 2017, the family purchased a forty-five-acre property, converting it from mixed farming and horsing into a fully irrigated operating turf farm specialising in residential and commercial instant lawn.
“Soon after purchasing the farm, we stood a 200m centre pivot for paddock irrigation. Six months later a storm rolled through and blew it over on the last day before the Christmas break and it took four months to get any money to fix it,” said Tim.
The farm only had forty irrigation pipes available to keep twenty acres of turf alive through forty-degree heat. The pipes needed moving four times a day for two months, just to keep the turf alive. At this point, the family had realised they had bought into the business during one of the worst droughts in history. The rain had stopped, and the dust just kept rolling in.
“By the end it was nothing to have two or three major dust storms a week,” said Tim.
This put a lot of strain on relationships and the family financially. Dubbo then brought water restrictions in which has never happened before, without any warning. The families only income stopped. Two weeks before restrictions came in, Tim sprayed out twenty-five acres of lucerne, not knowing that could have been a small income to help them through.
“We were just about to give up… when it finally rained.”
“I still remember the storms rolling in, looking out the window you could see the rain once it hit the river it followed it and kept going around us.”
Since then, they haven’t looked back. Covid hit and they initially weren’t sure of what would happen, but business was good, and sales have been consistent. The family had managed to build the business from the ground up through the worst drought in history.
As of now, Western Plains Turf have three employees full-time and four casuals. Tim said they have been slowly building up and investing in their equipment, acquiring a bigger truck and forklift as well as a turf harvester.
“We have absolutely built our name and business up through hard work and pride in all the work that we do, from the first phone call to the way we leave each job site and our after sales service,” said Tim.
Western Plains Turf are now one of the exclusive suppliers of TifTuf Hybrid Bermuda lawn in Central and Western NSW. Tim believes TifTuf is the perfect grass for the region and has seen some incredible results in challenging conditions to date.
Tim is looking forward to what the business can continue to achieve in the west over the coming years. They might have a brand-new name and logo, but the same great people and product remains.
