The Story

It took around fifteen years of planning and homework before Cameron Syme took the plunge and opened the Great Southern Distilling Company in Albany, Western Australia. Syme has worked across a range of business areas, primarily as a lawyer, but his dedication to producing world-class Australian whisky has pay dividends in recent years with the success of his Limeburners and Tiger Snake whiskies.

He started by creating a range of spirits on the outskirts of Albany before moving to a custom built distillery in 2007 that sits next to Princess Royal Harbour.

For the production of Limeburners, Western Australian malt is mashed and fermented and then twice distilled. The malt for the peated expressions is also smoked with West Australian peat, which adds its own distinctive character, different to Tassie or Scottish peat.

Maturation of the whiskies is constantly evolving. A range of different casks have been used from ex-Bourbon, ex-sherry, ex-port, ex-brandy (their own) and cask finishing is also employed. The Limeburners releases roughly split into two camps: cask strength expressions at around 61% ABV, and non-cask strength expressions which have been diluted to 40–48% ABV.

Great Southern’s new Tiger Snake Distillery in Porongurup marks another step forward for the company (a third gin distillery based in Margaret River was also recently completed). The Tiger Snake whiskey range, first distilled in 2007, pays homage to American-style corn and rye whiskey.

Tiger Snake Sour Mash is a Bourbon-style whiskey with a mashbill of corn, rye, malt and occasionally triticale (the latter a wheat-rye hybrid), while Rye of the Tiger is made with 60% rye and 40% malt. Both styles are matured in a combination of new and used American oak, while plans are afoot to move to new oak in future.

Dugite Whiskey, a mixed grain whisky, was released in May 2020, while around 50 barrels of rum are also being laid down each year.

Consider the growth potential of Tiger Snake next to the already strong Limeburners single malt brand and you’re looking at one of Australia’s most ambitious whisky projects. But making the rest of the country, and the world, aware of this ambition is now the next step, and it will be fascinating to see how this West Australian success story grows and matures over the next few years.