Hi Lisa
I wish you a belated welcome to the forum.
I wasn't sure if you were currently living in Upwey (you mentioned several places). My husband and I have led a very peripatetic life and lived just up the road from you in Tecoma for a couple of years (1974-1976) at the bottom of the hill on the road that goes down from the railway station (McNichol Road). In those days we had one neighbour, and the rest was untouched bushland, although there was a large farm directly opposite us. Google Maps street view shows me that it's quite different now. We worked in Melbourne and drove up the hill every morning at 7am to catch the train to the city. Once a week we followed the aromatic truck of the 'night man' up the road (and, yes, we were one of his 'customers').
Pat's post about kookaburras reminded me that we lived opposite the Birds' farm. ('Birds' was the name of the family who owned it.) One morning we woke to the sound of mooing, to discover that part of their herd had escaped and were wandering around our unfenced garden. A couple of years after we left, the farm was used as a setting for the TV mini series 'Against the Wind', starring Jon English.
Again, Google Maps tells me that the farm is now the 75-hectare Birdsland Reserve - nothing to do with birds, more to do with Birds, I assume. But I do remember the abundant birdlife, the occasional wallaby, the flood-prone creek that sometimes approached our doorstep, and the ever-present sound of Puffing Billy.
Regards, Rose