STANDING on the blustery peak of the Bullock Hills, looking south to the Hopkins River, you can easily see decades of tree plantings, courtesy of the Forsters.
Peter Forster talks passionately about a nearby spot where Aborigines used to sharpen their tools and how they probably sheltered in the rocks from biting winter winds.
There are stumps where the yellow box trees were probably cleared from the grassy woodlands to fuel the goldfields and help build nearby Ararat.
Since the 1980s, Peter and Chris have been redressing the plant losses.
They tell how, in the early days, this meant driving for more than an hour to the nearest native plant nursery or propagating trees themselves.
They point to woodlots that don't attract any credits because they will be harvested and also the red gums that grow thick and strong on the flats at the base of the hills. And then there are the new young trees growing well on a thin layer of defiant topsoil on the blustery peak.
"This is difficult country to do anything with. It should be a park, it is special," Peter said.
CarbonSmart payments are no lottery win but they do recognise the value in revegetation and represent a step towards that park.
"It (the CarbonSmart system) is early days, but someone has to start somewhere," Chris said.
