A FORMER Englishman has found his niche hand-crafting cricket bats, writes Ken Piesse.

The morning frosts up on Porcupine Ridge dictate the working hours for local cricket bat craftsman, father-of-three Julian Millichamp.

It's simply too chilly to begin work much before 8am.

"It takes at least three steaming cups of coffee plus the bus run to school and back to get any circulation and warmth into my hands," Julian says.

He and wife, Tracey, love life in the central highlands, and since May, have been operating their cottage cricket bat industry from an old disused dairy-come-grain store.

It's on the main road at Porcupine Ridge, just out of Daylesford in the heart of spa country.

Julian is English by birth and loves everything about winter in the highlands.

He says hand-crafting cricket bats is a constant joy.

Working as an independent cricket bat maker is particularly satisfying, he says, even if the cost of the English willow clefts, the wood blocks cut from specially grown and tended English willow trees, have risen by 30 per cent from one summer to the next, forcing the prices of top-of-the-range bats past $500.

"The aim every year is to be able to make up to 1000 bats, all hand-crafted from start to finish," Julian says.

"It's a magnificent place to live up here. Our main street is all very rural.

"There isn't even a general store here. You have to go to Glenlyon for that."

The couple had previously been based at nearby Shepherds Flat and fell in love with the new premises on first sight.

"It was built in the late 1880s and there were still some old leather saddles sitting here that the Clydesdales used to use working the fields," Julian says.

"You are surrounded by history and rolling hills.

"There are no interruptions.

"It's just you and your tools and the bats, of course."

Julian's "Screaming Cat" range of beautifully-weighted, handcrafted English willow bats are leaders in their field. They are now widely used throughout country Victoria and major capital cities.

Now 44, he has been making cricket bats since his mid-teens and has few equals among cricket's premier batmakers.

"It is always exciting when a new shipment of clefts comes in," Julian says.

"The wood has this certain beautiful aroma and feel, which I love.

"You can pick up a cleft and see the sheer quality of the wood and just know the pleasure someone is going to get from using it."

Julian has lived in Australia for 20 years.

He met Tracey, who is Australian-born, in Perth, and the couple now have three children, daughters Madeleine, 16, and Jocelynne, 15, and a son, Damon, 13.

"Victoria is truly beautiful," he says. "We were fortunate enough in 2004 to travel around Australia and see everything but nothing compares with the country here.

"That's why we came back."

Now that it's spring and the start of the new season, Julian will work 14 and 15-hour days, meeting his orders.

The major retailers always want more than he can supply.

Leading internationals have used his bats and will continue to, he says.

"Like many in the country, we're a grassroots husband and wife business," Julian says.

"You get out of it what you put in. You know at the end of the day that you have put in and that's a reward in itself."

Julian's workshop is open to the public on September 20 and 21. Go to Porcupine Ridge Rd, near Daylesford and follow the signs. For more details phone 0431 724 844 or visit his website www.screamingcat.com.au