Canberra Chris,I met Claire Stoneman & Diana Owen at a National Folk Festival in Canberra in 1984. I have infrequent email contact with Diana. I have also had e-mail chats with a harp maker, Bruce Lemin, whose harps I intend to check out next month, but I have not met him in non-cyber-reality yet.
I don't know of anyone around your area interested in zithers, but isn't the Monaro Folk Club somewhere around there? There are a few good Oz folk sites with contact details. I'll see what links I have bookmarked and post them here - over thweekend maybe.
Helen