African Elephant at Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary

situated outside the town of Tuakau near Auckland, New Zealand.

Its wildlife veterinarian surgeon (the late) Dr. Helen Schofield stands in front.

[Ed. Note elephant’s tusks have been previously sawn off by a circus]
(Photo by Associated Press, 20091220)

[Source: ^http://www.newsday.com/news/nation/ca-sanctuary-says-killer-elephant-still-welcome-1.3684690]

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Last Wednesday afternoon (20120425) New Zealand wildlife veterinarian surgeon, Dr. Helen Schofield, was tragically crushed to death by an African Elephant who sat on her at Franklin Zoo & Wildlife Sanctuary near Auckland, according to emergency officials and reports.

Reports say the female elephant was trying to protect the vet after the elephant got a fright and wrapped her trunk around the vet, before going down, killing the vet.  [Ed.  This suggests that it was an accident caused by fright, and not the intention of the elephant to kill the vet].  Emergency services say the woman died at the zoo/sanctuary at around 4.30pm local time.

What is significant is that this 39-year-old African elephant was formerly used and abused in circus entertainment (Loritz as well as Webers), where she had lived shackled for 28 years with no other elephants.  The circus had not surprisingly named the elephant ‘Jumbo‘.

Same elephant back in 2009, named ‘Jumbo’, tethered to Loritz Circus trailer for 28 years

African elephants in the wild live up to 70 years, but in captivity only to 50, not surprisingly.

[Watch Video at Webber’s Circus in 2009].

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About three years ago, the elephant was given to the SPCA Auckland (Society for the Prevention Against Cruelty to Animals, ^http://www.spca.org.nz/) which then found a refuge for it in 2009 at the Franklin Zoo and Wildlife Sanctuary just outside Auckland.  The elephant has for the past three years been under the care and rehabilitation at the zoo/sanctuary.

Dr Schofield at Franklin had previously stated that the elephant (renamed by the zoo ‘Mila‘) had settled in well and developed close and affectionate relationships with her team of keepers.  She wrote: “Our dream for Jumbo is to get her in a situation where she can have other African elephants for company.”

A woman who lives in a property neighbouring the zoo, who declined to be named, said she had seen the activity at the zoo when the ambulances arrived.

“We look out and see the elephant every day,” she said. “I don’t think it’s very friendly. It hasn’t had a very happy life.”

Same elephant in 2009
SAFE (Save Animals from Exploitation, NZ) animal rights protest group stage a protest outside the circus at Avalon Park, Lower Hutt, New Zealand
[Source: ‘Loritz Circus Jumbo the Elephant’, YouTube, ^http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5c00551DUw]

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Sad circus scenes only three years ago (different elephants)
[Source: ‘Jumbo Stars: Elephants in Carson & Barnes Circus’, YouTube,

^http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=jX58pNwWcRY]

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New Zealand Police have stated that if the death is confirmed as an accident it is unlikely the elephant will be put down, but a final decision will be made in 24 hours.  At the time of writing six days hence, the elephant is still alive and under care at the nearby Auckland Zoo (^http://www.aucklandzoo.co.nz/) awaiting her fate.

Same African Elephant, renamed ‘Mila’

Elephants are social creatures and there was concern Mila had been lonely.

Mila was the only elephant at the Franklin Zoo, which built a new enclosure for her in 2010.
(Photo Franklin Zoo/Sanctuary)

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[Sources: ‘Vet killed by elephant at Franklin Zoo‘, 3 News (NZ), 20120425, ^http://www.3news.co.nz/Vet-killed-by-elephant-at-Franklin-Zoo/tabid/423/articleID/251805/Default.aspx;  ‘Zoo Keeper Crushed To Death By Elephant‘, 20120425, Sky News (UK), ^http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16215812;  ‘Elephant kills keeper at Franklin Zoo‘, 20120425, Waikato Times (NZ), ^http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/news/6806389/Elephant-kills-keeper-at-Franklin-Zoo]

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Franklin Zoo and Wildlife Sanctuary was nearing the end of a two year preparatory re-adjustment process for the elephant to have her ultimately crate shipped to California (USA) to Pat Derby’s Performing Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) ^http://www.pawsweb.org/ in San Andreas outside Sacramento. Since 1984, The Performing Animal Welfare Society has provided a sanctuary for animals that have been the victims of the exotic and performing animal trades. PAWS also investigates reports of abused performing and exotic animals, documents cruelty and assists in investigations and prosecutions by regulatory agencies to alleviate the suffering of captive wildlife.

Despite the tragic accidental killing of Dr Schofield, Pat Derby has confirmed that it remains committed to receiving the elephant into its Californian sanctuary.

Hans Kriek, executive director of New Zealand based Save Animals from Exploitation ^http://www.safe.org.nz/, said he had talked to Dr Schofield the day before she died and that she told him she believed Mila was ready to ship.

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Pat Derby advised her experience with elephants rescued from circuses:

“All elephants, particularly Africans, suffer from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (Ed. like humans).

“They’re captured from the wild. The capture usually involves killing their whole family unit, which is a terrible drama.

They all suffer horrendous physical and psychological problems. You just never know when it will express itself.”

In addition, Derby said she is sure the stress of circus life contributed to the trauma of adjusting for Mila.

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In San Andreas, near Sacramento in Northern California, where Mila was headed, three African elephants are kept separate from other elephants, Derby said.

“We always keep safe distances and safety barriers between the elephants and the people so there’s no opportunity for accidents to happen“, she said.

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Elephant Shipment Trauma

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Transporting an elephant halfway around the world is extremely tricky, Derby said.  Flying is the fastest way but also the most expensive and “I don’t know what the funding issue is there,” Derby said.

If a ship and truck are used, it’s a “long, long journey,” she said.  Once an elephant leaves on such a trip, it is stuck in the crate until it arrives, she said.

[Source: ‘CA sanctuary says killer elephant still welcome‘, by Sue Manning and Nick Perry, Associated Press, 20120427, ^http://www.ktre.com/story/17796646/calif-sanctuary-say-killer-elephant-still-welcome]

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Wildlife for Entertainment is Immoral

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“When children see animals in a circus, they learn that animals exist for our amusement. Quite apart from the cruelty involved in training and confining these animals, the whole idea that we should enjoy the humiliating spectacle of an elephant or lion made to perform circus tricks shows a lack of respect for the animals as individuals”

~ Peter Singer, Author/Philosopher, Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University, USA

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Animal abuse and cruelty is immoral.  Most modern civilized societies have outlawed animal cruelty, making it a crime.

Entertainment involving animals is a form of animal abuse.  Circuses and zoos conceived for human entertainment are primitive and barbaric, dating back to 18th Century Georgian times when human slavery was cultiraly acceptable.  The first modern zoo evolved out of an aristocratic menagerie in Vienna in 1765.

Although many circuses have been banned from using wildlife in their entertainment, disgustingly it has only been in recent years.  But still, organisations such as Sea World (^http://www.sea-world.com.au/) still entertain the public using dolphins, seals and orcas.

Jumbo was the last of New Zealand’s circus elephants, retired in 2009 after a concerted pressure campaign by Save Animals from Exploitation (SAFE), and there are no more circuses that use wild animals in this country.  But the practice has still not been banned outright. This puts it in the category of anachronistic laws which should be repealed at the earliest opportunity.

In New Zealand,  Dunedin and Wellington City Councils have local bans on the use of wild animals in circuses. There is a Circus Welfare Code, but like many of the codes under the Animal Welfare Act 1999 appears to contravene the Act under which it was created, particularly section 4(c) which stipulates that animals must have the ‘opportunity to display normal patterns of behaviour.’   A requirement that is by definition outside the performance expected of a circus animal.

[Source: ‘Circus Animal Bans’, by Vernon Tava, 20110209, The Solution (NZ), ^http://thesolution.org.nz/2011/02/09/circus-animal-bans/]

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The plight of elephants in circuses is particularly troubling.  Elephants are majestic creatures who are intelligent and self-aware. They are among the most socially- bonded animals on the planet, and display a complex array of emotions, including expressions of grief and compassion. They mourn their dead, use tools, and communicate with each other over vast distances through sound. They are biologically designed to browse, constantly on the move for 18 or more hours out of the day, even where food is readily available…

But enslaved in circuses, far removed from conditions they need to thrive, elephants:

• Spend days at a time chained in cramped train cars or trucks, eating and sleeping in their own excrement, exposed to temperature extremes, for much of their lives. When not in transit, they are chained or confined in tiny pens, usually on concrete.
• Perform unnatural tricks that are often damaging to their bodies. Wild elephants do not stand on their heads or on two legs.
• Often display neurotic behavior, such as swaying and head-bobbing, from boredom and severe stress  (Ed. like Jumbo in the video above).
• Suffer from painful foot and joint disease, a leading cause of premature death in captive elephants, from standing too long on hard surfaces and in their own waste.

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Circuses Tear Families Apart

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Elephants have intense, strong family bonds. Wild females stay with their mothers, aunts and cousins for life. Males do not leave the herd until their teens. The entire extended elephant family helps nurture and care for the young.

Most of the elephants performing in circuses today were captured from the wild, violently separated from their mothers, and shipped to the U.S. when they were very young. Every Asian elephant taken from the wild has endured a brutal breaking process (“the crush”), which involves beating with nail-studded sticks, sleep-deprivation, hunger, and thirst to break the animals’ spirits.

Elephants born into captivity in circuses are routinely torn from their mothers as infants younger than two years old, for training and performance.

For anyone who knows about elephants, seeing these complex, family-centered individuals chained and broken, performing demeaning tricks is simply heartbreaking…

There’s no family fun to be had at an event that involves such cruelty and suffering. Let’s teach our children to respect animals by seeing them in their natural states, not as captives forced and beaten into unnatural displays for our entertainment.

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“We can see quite plainly that our present civilization is built on the exploitation of animals, just as past civilisations were built on the exploitation of slaves”

~ Donald Watson

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[Source:  ‘Plight Of The Circus Elephant’ , ^http://www.nonhumanslavery.com/plight-of-the-circus-elephant-excerpt-from-idas-elephant-life-in-us-circuses]

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As of 1 July 2010, the use of any animal in a circus has been banned in Bolivia. A handful of other countries have banned the use of wild animals in circuses but only Bolivia has banned exploitation of domestic animals in circuses as well.

The Bolivian law, which states that the use of all animals in circuses ‘constitutes an act of cruelty’ was enacted on 1 July 2009, with operators given a year to comply.

The bill took two years to pass through both chambers of the Plurinational Assembly, meeting stiff opposition from the eastern states of Bolivia where there was concern that the law would be expanded to include bullfighting, which is popular in rural villages. Bullfighting remains legal in Bolivia.

The legislature were eventually won over by a screening of videos shot by undercover circus infiltrators in Bolivia, Peru, Ecuador and Colombia co-ordinated and funded by Animal Defence International (ADI), a London-based NGO which found that ill-treatment and violence against animals in circuses is commonplace.

The harsh Bolivian climate alone claimed has claimed many victims. Just last year, a hippopotamus died in his sleep when the circus pool froze over in the Andean city of Potosí, 4000 metres above sea level. A dwarf elephant died of exposure in La Paz’s dry winter of 2007.

The follow-up to this law change is also important; with a number of wild animals no longer economically useful to their owners, many will be either killed or turned loose. Animals released from captivity generally do not re-integrate and are likely to die from starvation or attack from other animals. To avoid this, Ximena Flores, sponsor of the law, has said that “[a]bout 50 animals are circulating in national and international circuses at the moment [in Bolivia] and we want to negotiate to make sure that the animals aren’t eliminated.”

Austria, Costa Rica, Hungary, Finland, India, Israel, Singapore and most recently China have banned the use of wild circus animals while Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and the Czech Republic have limited the use of certain species. The State of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil and the cities of Buenos Aires (Argentina) and Porto Alegre (Brazil) have implemented full bans on both wild and domesticated species. Nationwide bans on all animals in traveling circuses are under consideration in Brazil, Colombia and Peru, where legislation is expected in the near future. Several major European towns and cities have either banned all circus animal acts or wild animal acts, including Thessaloniki (Greece), Barcelona (Spain), Cork (Ireland) and Venice (Italy). In Croatia, most major cities have bans.

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Australia

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In Australia, Ipswich Council (Queensland) and Parramatta (Sydney, NSW) have local bans of wild animals in circuses.

Around the world, the plight of animals in circuses is increasingly heard. National, regional and local governments in at least 30 countries have already banned the use of exotic or all animals in circuses. But the Australian Federal and State Government policies are failing these animals. The requirements in the — mostly voluntary — guidelines for the keeping of animals in circuses in Australia are far below what is generally required for the same species kept in zoos and are totally inadequate to protect their welfare. Thankfully an increasing number of Australian councils are taking an ethical stance by adopting a ban on exotic animal circuses on council land.

For Animals Australia, entertainment stops where animal suffering begins. Circuses can not recreate a natural environment nor can animals in circuses perform much natural behaviour. A non-domesticated animal’s life is consequently impoverished and the keeping of exotic animals in circuses should therefore be banned. The animals currently being kept by circuses need to be re-homed in a quality sanctuary or zoo.

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Britain

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Currently, Britain appears to be at at a critical juncture with regard to banning the use of performing wild animals. A ban in the UK would affect around 40 animals owned by four circus companies. On 25 March 2010, Labour’s environment minister, Jim Fitzpatrick, said he was “minded” to ban performing wild animals after research showed that 94 per cent of the public supported a ban. A survey by the Animals Defenders International (^http://www.ad-international.org/adi_uk/) of 310 local authorities (town and county councils) showed that 39% had already banned all animal acts and 17% had banned wild animal acts.

However, while the new Coalition government has said it is considering whether or not to proceed with the ban, 143 politicians have now signed a parliamentary Early Day Motion, (EDM) 403, calling for the wild animal ban to finally be implemented.

[Sources: ‘Circus Animal Bans’, by Vernon Tava, 20110209, ^http://thesolution.org.nz/2011/02/09/circus-animal-bans/, Circuses, Animals Australia, ^http://www.animalsaustralia.org/issues/circuses.php]

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Animal Suffering

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Exotic animals in circuses are routinely subjected to months on the road confined in small, barren cages. These animals are forced to live in enclosures denying them every opportunity to express their natural behaviour and their training is often based on fear and punishment as revealed by numerous undercover investigations.

As circuses play no meaningful role in education or conservation, the lifelong suffering of these animals continues only for the sake of a few minutes of entertainment.

Below: How do you get a wild animal to perform unnatural circus tricks?

This shocking undercover footage from the U.S. shows Carson & Barnes ‘trainers’ using bull hooks, electric prods, and even blowtorches on their elephants. Footage thanks to PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, ^http://www.peta.org/). ^http://www.animalsaustralia.org/issues/circuses.php

[WARNING:  MAY DISTURB, CONTAINS COURSE LANGUAGE]

How United States Carson and Barnes get elephants to do ‘tricks’ for cirus entertainment

 

^More videos from Animals Australia

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Circuses in 2012

‘Wild animals in circuses WILL be banned after ministers cave in to demands to launch crackdown’, by Kirsty Walker, UK, 20120301, ^http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2108504/Wild-animals-circuses-WILL-banned-ministers-cave-demands-launch-crackdown.html]

Saved by the Mail: Anne the elephant, pictured with former owner Bobby Roberts, who along with his wife Moira has been charged with causing the animal suffering

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Circuses will be banned from keeping wild animals within two years. Ministers will today announce the U-turn after coming under intense pressure from MPs and celebrities to implement the crackdown.  The Department for the Environment will confirm plans to introduce a law within this Parliament.

Last year, MPs inflicted a humiliating defeat on the Government by backing a backbench motion by Tory MP Mark Pritchard, which called for a ban.

Until this is introduced, ministers will bring in a tough licensing regime for the few circus owners still using wild animals.

An estimated 150 to 200 animals are currently held in circuses, 37 of which are wild. They include zebras, lions, tigers, camels, a  kangaroo and crocodiles.

Sir Paul McCartney, comedian Ricky Gervais and actor Brian Blessed are among the celebrities who have called for a ban, which 94 per cent of the public supports.

The Daily Mail has been at the forefront of the campaign after highlighting the plight of Anne, Britain’s last circus elephant.

Former owners Moira and Bobby Roberts have been charged with causing Anne suffering by failing to prevent her groom beating her.

The 59-year-old elephant now lives at Longleat safari park in Wiltshire thanks to our readers, who donated £340,000 for her care.
The prosecution is believed to be the first of a circus owner for animal cruelty under the Animal Welfare Act 2006.

An estimated 150-200 animals are currently held in circuses, and an estimated 37 of these are wild animals. These include zebras, lions, snakes, tigers, camels, a kangaroo and crocodiles.

Prime Minister David Cameron has previously signalled his support for the crackdown by acknowledging that it was ‘not right’ to still have lions and tigers performing in the big top.

A Defra spokesman said: ‘We always said we were minded to ban wild animals performing in travelling circus, the only issue being that we have to be sure that it cannot be overturned legally.  ‘Therefore in the meantime we are proposing a tough new licensing regime which can be introduced quickly, to ensure high welfare standards.’

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Entertainment Zoos or Wildlife Sanctuaries?

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Removal of wild animals from their habitat is wrong.  They should be left in their natural surroundings and not exploited as objects for human entertainment.

In situ wildlife refuges or wildlife sanctuaries play a critical role in habouring wildlife at risk from poaching and from the many human drivers of extinction.  Wildlife refuges or wildlife sanctuaries situated in the native country of origin are best placed to enable wildlife to survive naturally.  Zoological captive breeding programmes that facilitate wildlife reintroduction into the wild in safe sanctuaries are to be commended.  This is where the resourcing, efforts and research need to be channelled globally.

But shipping wildlife over long distances to foreign and typically urban zoos, benefits human entertainment not the wildlife.  Elephants belong in Africa or Asia according to their supbspecies, not in New Zealand.  Petting zoos that encourage the public to get up and close with the animals are a mere extension of circuses – wildlife for human entertainment and as tourist drawcards/attractions.

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Compare the Old Urban Entertainment Zoos:

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Example 1:    Auckland Zoo

The Tourist child spiel:

‘Auckland Zoo is home to the largest collection of native and exotic animals in New Zealand, set in 17 hectares of lush parkland and just five minutes from central Auckland.  There is lots to see and do all year, including events, animal encounters, Zoom (behind the scenes) tours and more!  Our Zoom (behind-the-scenes) Tours offer you an exclusive backstage pass to go behind the scenes. Imagine helping a keeper wash down an elephant, coming eye to eye with New Zealand fauna, a tiger, or one of Africa’s big five.’

^http://www.aucklandzoo.co.nz/

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Example 2:     Taronga Zoo  (Sydney, Australia)

‘Function and Venue Hire:

 

‘With 180 degree, uninterrupted views of Sydney Harbour, Taronga Zoo provides a picturesque backdrop and unique setting that is guaranteed to make any event truly   memorable.    With a wide a variety of venue options available, both in and outdoors,Taronga Zoo is an ideal setting for all occasions ranging from gala dinners, conferences, Christmas and cocktail parties as well as boasting a truly stunning venue for Weddings.The Taronga were the proud winners of the 2010 Restaurant and Catering Awards for Excellence -Wedding Caterer in a Function Centre AND voted in the Vogue Top 3 wedding locations 2012.  With both these outstanding recognitions for excellence, the Taronga centre combining their passion and enthusiasm for food and their excellence in service and events is certainly an ideal choice to host your next event.’

^http://www.taronga.org.au

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..with the In Situ Wildlife Sanctuaries:

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Example 3:   Orokonui Ecosanctuary  (Waitati, Dunedin, New Zealand)

‘What began as a mere dream to restore an entire forest ecosystem to its pre-human state, is now a reality.

In less than 10 years, the Orokonui Ecosanctuary has become the only place on mainland South Island of New Zealand where native birds, animals and insects can live a life safe from predators. They are free to fly, feed, mate and nest wherever they wish, exactly as they would in the wild.

Since the $2.2 million, 8.7km pest-proof fence was erected around our 307 hectares of protected habitat in 2007, pests have been almost entirely eradicated. This has allowed us to reintroduce a number of endangered species and there are encouraging signs they are adapting well to their new home. In fact, it is becoming increasingly common for native birds to find their own way to the ecosanctuary and take up residence.

To support the Ecosanctuary, a multi-million dollar eco-friendly visitor and ODT education centre has been built into the hillside above Blueskin Bay. Here, visitors can learn about the Ecosanctuary and the native species it contains, take a guided tour through the Ecosanctuary, purchase gifts and educational material from the souvenir shop, or simply have a coffee and enjoy the view.  All of the funds generated from visitors contribute to the ongoing conservation work at Orokonui Ecosanctuary.’

^http://www.orokonui.org.nz/

 

Example 4:   Enkosini Wildlife Sanctuary  (Northern Provence, South Africa

‘The Enkosini Wildlife Reserve was formed in 2001 to protect and preserve Africa’s wildlife and habitat.  Enkosini (derived from the Zulu word meaning “place of kings”) was established as a conservancy, by purchasing and joining together large South African farms with the aim of restoring the environment back to its natural state and establishing a larger reserve for the benefit of African wildlife.  Enkosini is a unique conservation initiative that will re-introduce indigenous wildlife onto land they once naturally roamed, ultimately re-establishing all of the original flora and fauna to the area.  Enkosini will also continue to acquire habitat for the long-term survival of the wildlife and the preservation of their eco-systems.

Enkosini’s goal is to create a self-sustaining model of responsible conservation that preserves Africa’s natural heritage (habitat and wildlife); enhances the South African economy through overseas capital infusion, local and international eco-tourism, and job creation; and promotes education and awareness of conservation issues.’

^http://www.enkosiniecoexperience.com/EnkosiniWildlifeSanctuary.htm

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Spot the core difference?

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Australian native Galahs

derived from indigenous Yuwaalaraay word ‘gilaa‘ 

(Eolophus roseicapilla)

Just because Galahs are currently abundant, gives no-one the right to steal them and imprison them from the wild

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Wildlife does not exist so that it may be petted!

Wildlife exists for its own right, as members of fragile yet disappearing ecosystems, defying the hand of humans.  Many humans are not content to observe and respect wildlife in their native habitat.  Such folk are anthropocentric, wanting to own wildlife as property and label them as ‘pets‘.

The mindset is as backward as colonial Europeans once owned Black slaves.  Such anthropocentric thinking folk would not have a clue about the concept of ‘ecology‘ where humans are part of the environment, but instead control and dominate it.  Such folk may even naively only comprehend the term to be that recently hijacked by Information Technologists – in the realm of commerce.

The Atlantic Slave Trade once was Legal

…doesn’t mean it was right, just culturally acceptable

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While 21st Century society mostly has morally matured:

• to abolish the Slave Trade
• to respect the rights of Children
• to respect the rights of Women
• to respect the rights of Indigenous peoples

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.. still the Wildlife Slave Trade persists in 21st Century society, as if somehow it is morally distinguishable from the Human Slave Trade.

No law has yet legitimised this distinction.  Instead, society relies upon prevailing socio-cultural norms to allow the immoral trade in wildlife to persist.

This is unacceptable.

Humans breed wildlife and keep wildlife as pets for their own gratification, not for the benefit of wildlife per se.  Pet shops are permitted by the Australian Government to keep and sell wildlife as pets such as native birds, native reptiles, native marsupials and native Dingoes.  Animals are excluded from the Crimes Act.  But this is no different to excluding Australian Aborigines from criminal law during early colonial Australia up until 1838 (Myall Creek Massacre).  It is no different to the use of child labour during the Industrial Revolution, nor any different to the patriarchal prejudice assigning women less rights somehow than men.

It is ‘moral exclusion‘, like when soldiers before battle are conditioned to dehumanise the enemy in order to psychologically distance themselves from selected humans to permit massacring other humans with impunity.   Such ‘dehumanization‘ can make violating generally accepted norms of behavior regarding one’s fellow man seem reasonable, or even necessary (Maiese, 2003) – like the Australian Airforce helping the United States bomb the Vietnamese back into the Stone Age.

“Tell the Vietnamese they’ve got to draw in their horns or we’re going to bomb them back into the Stone Age.”

~ US General Curtis LeMay, May 1964

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Australians witness this moral exclusion mindset being translated into Australia’s ongoing kangaroo slaughter on an industrial scale.

But sentience is sentience, a life is a life.   Breeding and trading in domesticated animals is treating animals as property, like clothes and a car.  Ancient Romans treated slaves as property and their ancient laws upheld their immorality.

Australia is not the ancient Roman Empire.  Respect for the equal rights of humans is enshrined in Australian cultural values and laws.  Yet our moral relativism judges excluding wildlife from our cultural values and laws.  Why?  How is this legitimate, appropriate and right?  It isn’t.

Wildlife come under threat from humans from over a dozen exploitative excuses – deforestation, bushfire, poaching, etc.   Wildlife smugglers and wildlife traders (‘pimps‘) make a profit from the theft, breeding and trading in wildlife.  It is exploitation and is morally wrong, yet the laws do not uphold morality in the case of wildlife.  When laws fail to uphold moral cultural values, civilised society is undermined.   The Roman Empire may have thought of itself as a civilised society in ancient times, despite its institutionalised slavery; but in the 21st Century, Australian civilised society warrants a higher standard.

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Dural Pet Superstore Burns Down

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Then when a pet shop burns down killing all animals inside including wildlife, one can only imagine the suffering as the animals are burned to death, locked up inside, abandonned.

This morning at around 2am, the Dural Pet Superstore in outer north-western Sydney caught fire in an industrial complex, the Dural Business Centre at 915 Old Northern Road Dural, as a result of an adjoining commercial premises igniting. Police say the fire broke out at a tyre factory although the cause was not immediately clear.

Animals being burned to death in the Dural pet shop fire

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It was the fire alarm of the pet store that alerted the fire bridage to attend, but it was too hot and too late for the amimals in the pet shop.

Pet native reptiles for sale on the Dural Pet Superstore website

like our native Water Dragons and Bearded Dragon Lizards (above)

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Inspector Ben Shepherd from the NSW Rural Fire Service said some parts of the complex, including the Dural Pet Superstore, had been destroyed.
Hundreds of animals from the store are assumed dead.  The store sold rabbits, guinea pigs, chickens and budgies.

“We stock a wide range of finches, as well as young and adult budgies… we also sell quails, cockatiels, canaries, peach face lovebirds and more.”  

                                                                                             ~ Dural Pet Superstore website

Native Galahs being offered for sale on the Dural Pet Superstore website

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The store housed birds, chickens, fish and the renowned rainbow lorikeet ‘Pierre’ – who had been with the store for 11 years.

Rainbow Lorikeet for sale at the Dural Pet Superstore

(Trichoglossus haematodus)

Native parrot of Australia and the south west pacific region

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The Tyrepower Store, next to the Dural Pet Superstore

Picture by Natalie Roberts

Would a creche or nursing home with unattended sleeping occupants be permitted at this location?

Typical official answer:  No, animals do not have the same value as humans, so it doesn’t matter.

Sulphur-crested Cockatoo for sale on the Dural Pet Superstore website

[Cacatua galerita]

Just because Cockatoos are currently abundant, gives no-one the right to steal them and imprison them from the wild

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[Sources:  ‘All animals dead as fire guts Sydney pet shop’, April 24, 2012, AAP, http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/all-animals-dead-as-fire-guts-sydney-pet-shop-20120424-1xifv.html, ^http://www.hillsnews.com.au/news/local/news/general/fire-investigation-for-dural-factory-blaze/2531860.aspx]

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New South Wales Rural Fire Service spokesman Ben Shepherd said seven businesses were damaged during the fire, which included a tyre store, a mechanic and a pet store.

“There was considerable loss to the pet store and there were pets inside”,’ he said.

“The owners were visibly shaken and the business is well known for keeping fish, birds and puppies.”

Investigations into the origin of the fire will take place when the fire cools and the integrity of the building is established.  Mr Shepherd said it was too early to tell if the fire was suspicious.  [Ed:  How qualified is the RFS in large urban fire fighting; is this not the task of the professional urban-trained Fire Brigade?]

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[Source:  ‘animals-perish-in-dural-blaze, Hornsby Advocate, 20120424, ^http://hornsby-advocate.whereilive.com.au/news/story/animals-perish-in-dural-blaze/]

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Time to ban the sale of animals (especially wildlife) from pet shops

 

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Pet shops should only be for the sale of pet food and accessories.

However, since the Australian pet shop market for live animals represents the lure of big money, ‘backstreet breeders‘ and ‘puppy farmers‘ are indiscriminately producing enormous quantities of puppies and kittens and selling them to pet shops.

The Australian Government needs to outlaw puppy farms and backyard breeders to put them out of business. Unfortunately they do trade through many Pet Shops, so Pet Shops have become a big part of the problem. We certainly recognise that Pet Shops are not the only cause of the problem. But however you look at it, there are too many animals bred and not enough homes for them all. That’s why so many are euthanased every year.  Anything we can do to stop excessive breeding and impulse selling will reduce the numbers killed. Animals should not be bred for profit only to end up being killed when the money has been made.

‘More puppies inside’…pet shop in Missouri, USA

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Pet shops encourage the impulse purchase of animals by ill-informed people who later discard their pet when they realise that pet ownership is not as easy or cheap as they thought. These are the animals that end up in the pounds and many thousands are euthanased each year.

Even though statistics are difficult to obtain and are poorly kept, we estimate that 130,000 dogs and 60,000 cats are euthanased each year in Australia by animal welfare agencies. There are simply too many bred and not enough homes. This is an absolute disgrace and no humane Australian could possibly want this situation to continue.

How much is that doggy in the window?

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People can buy their animal companion from pounds, animal shelters or rescue centres and save a rejected animal’s life in the process!

Or visit a reputable, registered breeder. They will receive better information on the future care of their pet and be vetted for suitability as an owner.

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[Source:  Say No To Animals in Pet Shops, ^http://www.saynotoanimalsinpetshops.com/]

 

The only good pet shop is a closed pet shop

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Further Reading:

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[1]     Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) in Australia, ^http://www.rspca.org.au/

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[2]    Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) in the United Kingdom, ^http://www.rspca.org.uk/home 

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[3]    American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA),^http://www.aspca.org/

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[4]    People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals  (PETA), ^http://www.peta.org/issues/companion-animals/pet-shops.aspx

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[5]    Say No To Animals in Pet Shops, ^http://www.saynotoanimalsinpetshops.com/

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[6]    Aninal Liberation Victoria,  ^http://www.alv.org.au/storyarchive/0712puppy/cruel.php

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[7]   Paws for Action (NSW),  ^http://www.pawsforaction.com/

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[8]   Pet Store Abuse,  ^http://www.petstoreabuse.com/links.html

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[9]   Animal Liberation on Pet Stores, ^http://animal-lib.org.au/subjects/animals-as-companions/261-pet-shops-puppy-farms-and-pounds.html,  Website: ^http://animal-lib.org.au/

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[10]   Oscar’s Law, ^http://www.oscarslaw.org/about.php

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[11]    ‘Dehumanization‘,  by Michelle Maiese, Beyong Intractability (website), July 2003, ^http://www.beyondintractability.org/bi-essay/dehumanization

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Pure Dingo

(Canis lupus ssp. dingo)

Rare and ‘Vulnerable’ on Fraser Island, Queensland

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The Dingo is possibly as old as the last Ice Age

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The earliest archaeological evidence for dingoes in Australia,  indicates that the arrival of dingoes in Australia can be dated back to about 18, 000 years BP (before present), based upon mitochondrial DNA data collected by scientists from The Royal Society.  [Source:  ^http://savefraserislanddingoes.com/pdf/Evolution%20of%20the%20Dingo.pdf,  [>Read Report  (512kb) ]

Significantly, 18,000 BP was when the last Ice Age ended in Australia, referred to as the Last Glacial Period (Glacial Maximum) when much of the world was cold, dry, and inhospitable.  It is the geological epoch in world evolution known as the Pleistocene Epoch, which in archaeology corresponds to the end of the human Paleolithic Age.  At this time, Australia, New Guinea, and Tasmania were one land mass called Sahulland.   Note, this is not to be confused with ‘Gondwanaland‘, which existed between about 510 to 180 million years ago (Mya).

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Sahulland or just ‘Sahul‘ was the name chosen by archaeologists at a conference in 1975  [Allen, J.; J. Golson and R. Jones (eds) (1977). Sunda and Sahul: Prehistorical studies in Southeast Asia, Melanesia and Australia’].   Other names offered include ‘Australasia‘ and ‘Greater Australia‘, and this larger land mass forms the basis of Australia’s Continental Shelf, half of which is less than 50 metres deep under the Torres Strait to New Guinea and Bass Strait to Tasmania.

Evolutionary global warming melted the glacias and so rose sea levels, which overflowed the interconnecting lowlands and separated the continent into today’s low-lying arid to semi-arid mainland and the two mountainous islands of New Guinea and Tasmania.   Not surprisingly, flora and fauna across these long separate lands have a comparable biota.  Since Papua New Guinea and Australia were connected via a land-bridge until 6,000 years ago, travelling from one to the other would have been possible.

DNA-analysis has shown that New Guinea Singing Dogs have a genetic line back to Australian dingos.   Genetic analysis reported in March 2010 by Australian Geneticist Dr. Alan Wilton (1953-2011), from the UNSW School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences found the mtDNA-type A29 among Australian dingoes concluded overwhelmingly that genetically, the Australian Dingo and the New Guinea Singing Dog are closely related to each other.

Australian Geneticist Dr. Alan Wilton (1953-2011)

an expert on Australian Pure Dingos

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Dr Alan Wilton’s study paper published in the journal Nature suggests that those two breeds are the most closely related to wolves and may be most like the original domesticated dog as it was across Asia and the Middle East thousands of years ago, according to one of the 37 authors of the study, making both Australia’s dingo and the New Guinea Singing Dog possibly the world’s oldest dog breeds.

“This paper examines the domestication of the dog from the wild wolf using genetic differences,” Dr Wilton says. “48,000 sites in the dog genome were examined in hundreds of wolves, almost a thousand dogs from 85 modern breeds of dog and several ancient dog breeds.  “The data suggest most dogs were domesticated in the Middle East, which was the cradle of agriculture 10,000 of years ago, rather than in Asia as had been suggested previously.

“It also shows dingoes, which have been separated from other breeds of dog in Australia for the past 5,000 years, are the most distinct dog group with most similarity to wolves.”

The dingo and New Guinea Singing Dog stand out as being most different from all other breeds of dogs and closer to wolves than other breeds.

To gather all of the results from many dog breeds and wolves from many locations, a worldwide effort was mounted.   Dr Wilton and Jeremy Shearman – from the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences and the Ramaciotti Centre for Gene Function Analysis at UNSW – have been working on dingoes and methods to differentiate between pure dingoes and crosses between domestic dogs and dingoes.  They contributed the genetic data from seven dingoes, which is a small amount of data but makes a large contribution to the paper.  The data from all samples was analysed together at Cornell University and UCLA.

[Source:  ‘Dingo may be world’s oldest dog‘, by Bob Beale, 20100318, ^http://www.science.unsw.edu.au/news/dingo-may-be-world-s-oldest-dog/]

 

New Guinea Singing Dog

(Canis lupus familiaris hallstomi)

An ancient genetically pure dog breed with links to the Australian Dingo

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Further biotechnical research published in September 2011 by The Royal Society (UK) has found direct genetic links between ancient Polynesian dogs of South China, Mainland Southeast Asia and Indonesia to the extent that the Dingo has been found to be a direct descendant species dating back to 18,000 BP.    The oldest dog remains found in the world are fragments of a dog’s skull and teeth discovered in a cave in Switzerland dating back more than 14,000 years BP, so the dingo is 4000 years older that this.

Genetic study by Klutsch and Savolainen in 2011 concluded that South China was the probable source population for Dingoes and Singing Dogs dating the arrival of dingoes in Australia between 4,640 years ago and as far back as 18,100 years ago. They find “a clear indication that Polynesian dogs as well as dingoes and NGSDs trace their ancestry back to South China through Mainland Southeast Asia and Indonesia.

[Source:  ‘Reflections on the Society of Dogs and Men’, in Dog Law Reporter, 20111108, ^http://doglawreporter.blogspot.com.au/2011/11/canoe-conquests-of-western-pacific-who.html]

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Original Natural Distribution of the Dingoes Ancestors

[Source: ^http://www.naturalhistoryonthenet.com/Mammals/dingo.htm]

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The Dingo is an integral apex predator across Australian ecology

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As with other canids, over thousands of years the Dingo is a descendent of the wolf (Canis lupus).

Eastern Grey Wolf

(Canis lupus lycaon)

[Source:  Long live the big, bad, beautiful, snarling wolf, they are wild animals!

^http://www.lovethesepics.com/2012/03/whos-afraid-of-the-big-bad-beautiful-wolf-56-pics/]

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Yet after 18,000 years, the Australia Pure Dingo has evolved into a pure unique subspecies in its own right – ‘Canis lupus ssp. dingo’  [ssp. = subspecies]

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The Dingo is not a breed of dog, but a distinct subspecies of ancient wolf  (Canid lupus).

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Domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) are a separate subpecies of wolf, and of course domestic dogs have multiple breeds mainly due to human interference, referred to as ‘selective breeding‘.   Other modern subspecies of the ancient wolf is the Eurasian wolf (Canis lupus lupus), the Coyote (Canis latrans) and the Black-backed jackal (Canis mesomelas) as well as many other subspecies globally.

Coyote (Canis latrans)

[Source: ^http://true-wildlife.blogspot.com.au/2011/02/coyote.html]

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The Dingo for thousands of years has been Australia’s largest mammalian predator.   It has evolved to become an integral part of the native Australian ecology, as apex (top order) predators at the top of the natural food chain and highly adaptive and naturally distributed across every habitat and region of Australia, except Tasmania.

The Dingo’s natural prey consists of small native mammals and ground-dwelling birds, as well as small kangaroos and similar ‘macropods‘ (kangaroo botanical family ‘Macropodidae‘).  In this way, naturally occurring population of dingoes has played a key role in maintaining the populations and diversity of these native species.

Unlike domestic dogs, the Dingo yelps and howls, but generally does not bark.  It has a different gait to domestic dogs with almost with a cat-like agile habit.  Its ears are always erect and it uses its paws like hands.  In its natural state the Dingo lives either alone or in a small group unlike many other wild dog species which may form packs.  Dingoes tends to survey their surroundings from a height.

Whereas traditional Aboriginal occupation of Australia evolved over thousands of years with harmonious ecological interaction and respect, European colonial invasion of Australia and the widespread deforestation and introduced species that came with it, has destroyed or otherwise perverted Australia’s natural ecology.  Dingos and Colonist-introduced domestic dogs interbreed freely resulting in very few pure-bred dingos in southern or eastern Australia. This is seriously threatening the dingo’s ability to survive as a pure species. Public hostility is another threat to the dingo.

Australian Aboriginal peoples commonly refer to the dingo as the ‘Warragul‘.  This name has been used for a town 100km south-east of Melbourne, reflective of the traditional presence of the dingo as far south as southern Victoria.  Other Aboriginal names for Dingo across Australia include include ‘binure‘ and ‘mirragang‘ (Gundungurra  language), ‘mirri‘ (Darug language), ‘nurragee‘ and ‘mirragang‘ (Tharawal language).

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Pure Dingo at Risk of Extinction

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Pure-bred Dingo numbers in the Australian wild are declining as Colonists and their decendants continue to encroach deeper into wilderness areas, releasing feral dogs that inevitably compete, socialise and breed with pure Dingoes.

Professor Bill Ballard of the School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences at the University of New South Wales has conducted research showing that there are few remaining pure dingoes are left in wild. [Read More].

According to Dr. Alan Wilton’s mitochondrial DNA testing of Dingoes from 2000, most Dingo populations throughout Australia are 80% hybrids, with some 100% hybrids.    Only a few populations remain ‘Pure Dingo‘.  One area isolated from colonial incursion is the southern Blue Mountains region of New South Wales, which has been designated a Dingo Conservation Area, supposedly to control wild dogs in this area in order to prevent cross-breeding with pure Dingoes and the hybridisation of the Dingo species.  [>Read More  (480kb) ]

In 2005, the Dingo was listed on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species as ‘Vulnerable‘ due to a 30% decrease in numbers (IUCN = ‘International Union for Conservation of Nature’).  [^Read More]

However, the IUCN wrongly groups the Australian Dingo (Canis lupis ssp. dingo) with the New Guinea Singing Dog (Canis lupus familiaris hallstomi) and with other South East Asian dogs under its Red List classification ‘Canis lupus ssp. dingo‘.  This fails to assign proper genetic distriction of the Pure Australian Dingo as a discrete subspecies, which has evolved in Australia over thjousands of years quite separately from these other South East Asian subspecies.   The IUCN contradictorily uses the term ‘dingo’ to refer to the Australian Pure Dingo and at the same time in a generic sense as a common name to describe the wild dogs of Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and New Guinea.  The IUCN interpretation is contradictory and wrong.

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The ‘Australian Pure Dingo’ is not a Polynesian domestic dog!

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On the one hand , the IUCN explains the difficulty of distinguishing pure dingoes from hybrids and states that the “pure form may now be locally extinct (Corbett 2001)” and that “such quantitative data is not available for countries other than Australia, Thailand and Papua New Guinea“.   Yet the IUCN website shows only two known mapped locations of this subspecies – both being on Fraser Island (Aboriginal: K’Gari).

The IUCN concludes that where the most genetically intact populations live is where conservation efforts should be focused.

Fraser Island  (K’Gari)

Showing possibly the last of the planet’s Australian Pure Dingo distribution,

according to the IUCN in 2011

[Source: The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, version 2011.2, ^http://maps.iucnredlist.org/map.html?id=41585]

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Given the severely restricted distribution of the Pure Australian Dingo, this subspecies deserves discrete classification and listing by the IUCN as ‘Critically Endangered‘.  Clearly more intensive research by the IUCN is warranted, particularly recognising the recent and expert studies in this specific field by Professor Bill Ballard, Dr Alan Wilton and Jeremy Shearman, amongst others.

Recognition of the Pure Australian Dingo as at risk is given inconsistent hotch-potch protection by Australian jurisdictions.  In New South Wales (NSW), Dingo populations from Sturt National Park, the coastal ranges and some coastal parks have been nominated as endangered populations under the NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995.  At Australian national level and under the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974, the Dingo remains unprotected despite being considered a native species.  Under the Rural Lands Protection Act 1998 (NSW), Dingoes are still declared a pest species, a throwback to the colonial mindset.

Dr Wilton predicts that within 100 years, the pure dingo will be extinct in the wild.

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‘Dingo’s are going away the Thylacine unfortunately, unless somebody does something about it soon we won’t have any dingo’s left.’

 

The Thylacene

Persecuted by misguided Colonists until its extinction in the 1930s

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Dr Wilton has identified that there remains only one genetically confirmed population of pure dingoes – those on Queensland’s Fraser Island – perhaps as few as 120 individuals left.  This clan was long isolated from early colonial invasion and disturbance, but in recent times has increasingly been threatened by growing tourism incursions (400,000 tourists annually) and mismanagement and persecution by Queensland wildlife rangers.   Yet despite the precarious viability of this precious pure Dingo population, in 2001 Queensland Labor Premier Peter Beattie ordered a mass slaughter of forty dingoes in retribution for a boy tourist being killed that year by Dingoes on the island. [>Read More]

Clearly the Queensland Labor Party and the delegated custodian, the Department of Environment and Resource Management (DERM) (or whatever its latest rebranded name) values Fraser Island for anthopocentric tourism more than the survival of the Australian Dingo as a species.   Fraser Island is World Heritage Listed, but the Queensland Government has always interpreted this as a tourism branding strategy.

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‘Genetically pure dingoes face extinction’

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[Source:  ‘Genetically pure dingoes face extinction’, by Peter McAllister (science writer and anthropologist from Griffith University), 20110311, ^http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/journal/dingo-populations-at-risk-from-hybrids.htm]

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‘Dingoes are often in headlines for all the wrong reasons – agressive behaviour to tourists, culls by national park authorities – but behind the scenes, conservationists hold concerns that dingoes may be interbred into extinction.

Fears for the dingo’s future are proliferating. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) upgraded the dingo’s conservation status to vulnerable in 2004 and dingo experts such as Dr Ricky Spencer from the University of Western Sydney, have predicted Australia’s native canine will go extinct within the next twenty years.

 

Purebred Dingo

(Photo: Bradley Smith)

[Source: ^http://www.australiangeographic.com.au/journal/dingo-populations-at-risk-from-hybrids.htm]

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But it’s not just their white socks that are changing though. One recent study found that average dingo weight and size has risen by 20 per cent over the past two decades, probably because of hybridisation.    This change could alter the way dingoes hunt, allowing them to attack livestock and wildlife they’ve previously found an unmanageable size.

Behavioural changes also cause ecological problems. There is some evidence, for instance, that the dingo breeding season has grown longer under the influence of domestic dog genes; dogs breed twice a year, in contrast to the dingo’s single season. This might be one reason for the explosion in dingo and wild dog numbers across the country.

Another might be the breakdown in the pack structure of dingo societies. In the wild, dingo packs sometimes centre around a breeding alpha pair which suppress the breeding of subordinate members – a possible natural population control measure. Domestic dogs, however, seem to form larger packs with uncontrolled breeding, again possibly contributing to the current population explosion.

Hybridisation with domestic doges is the Dingo’s greatest threat. Dingoes and domestic dogs, both subspecies of Canis lupus, can interbreed with ease and this has led to a massive influx of domestic dog genes into the dingo gene pool.

In many places around Australia (some experts say ‘most‘) dingoes have been almost totally replaced by dog-dingo hybrids.   Even those animals that appear to be dingoes are often now, in reality, mostly domestic dogs. “The only way to tell for sure,” says Dr Guy Ballard, a dingo researcher with the NSW government’s vertebrate pest unit, “is by analysing their skulls, or taking DNA samples”.

But it’s not just their white socks that are changing though. One recent study found that average dingo weight and size has risen by 20% over the past two decades, probably because of hybridisation. This change could alter the way dingoes hunt, allowing them to attack livestock and wildlife they’ve previously found an unmanageable size..

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Saving the Purebred Dingo

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This inexorable tide of hybridisation has lent new urgency to the question of how best to save the dingo. Most experts are pessimistic about the chances of preventing interbreeding, pointing out that contact between dog and dingo populations is only going to increase.

Some proponents advocate the establishment of refuges where remnant populations of pure dingoes could be maintained. The best known of these is Fraser Island, where the Great Sandy National Park protects what is regarded as the purest population of dingoes left in Australia. However, the culling of problem dingoes on the popular tourist island has led to fears that the dingo population there is now too small to be genetically viable.

Such concerns have led some conservationists to opt for a different strategy: establishing their own private breeding refuges on the mainland instead. One such is the Australian Dingo Conservation Association’s (ADCA) 92 ha compound at Colong station in the Blue Mountains National Park.

There the ADCA maintains a breeding population of 31 purebred dingoes.

“We try hard to maintain that genetic purity,” says ADCA vice-president Gavan McDowell. “We even separate our breeding packs into sub-types, like mountain, desert and tropical dingoes.”

The Association’s ultimate aim is to breed a number of pure dingoes that can be released into the wild to recolonise areas, cleared of feral dogs.

Silver Lining

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Other researchers, like Guy, are more optimistic of the dingo’s plight.

His research includes several field projects looking at dingo purity around Australia. While Guy acknowledges that hybridisation is a major threat, he says that wherever his group tests dingoes, even in heavily hybridised areas of NSW, they still find good numbers of purebred dingoes.

“People often don’t realise that the environmental factors that lead to large numbers of hybrids also mean large numbers of pure dingoes,” Guy says. “It’s impossible to prove, but I suspect there are actually more purebred dingoes around today than at any other time in history.”

Best of all, says Guy, is the fact that his team has identified several hotspots where pure dingo numbers are consistently high. One is the Tanami Desert, where the dingo population is 90 per cent pure, apparently due to the area’s remoteness. Two others, however, lie on the heavily settled NSW coast: at Myall Lakes National Park and Limeburners Creek Nature Reserve.

Quirks of geography – Limeburners Creek is on a peninsula, and Myall Lakes is connected by green belts to the wilder lands out to Sydney’s west – have apparently allowed both areas to sustain populations of pure dingoes, despite their proximity to settled areas with large populations of domestic dogs.

Guy also believes that with careful management – such as continual DNA tests to identify and euthanise hybridised dogs – the populations at Limeburners Creek and Myall Lakes can maintain their purity for some time to come.

 

“Dingoes have survived two hundred years of interbreeding already,” he says.

“I don’t see why, with a little help, they can’t survive for another two hundred.”

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Aboriginal Respect for Dingoes

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‘Following its arrival into Australia, the dingo was readily accepted into Aboriginal life, both practically and spiritually.  Dingoes have long been valued companion animals to Aboriginal peoples, serving as hunting companions, camp guard dogs, camp cleaners and as bed warmers on cold nights.

Spiritually, dingoes have been regarded as a protector (particularly by traditional Fraser Island tribes) and representing ancestral spirits – able to perceive the presence of evil spirits undetectable by humans. Mythological or Dreamtime stories about the Dingo in Aboriginal cultures across Australia are for Aboriginal people to convey.

Dingoes are valued companion animals to traditional Aboriginal peoples

Dingoes are as Australian as Aboriginal peoples.

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Further Reading:

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[1]  ‘Vanishing Icon: The Fraser Island Dingo‘, by Jennifer Parkhurst, 2010, Print, published by Grey Thrush Publishing, St Kilda, Victoria, Australia, ^http://savefraserislanddingoes.org.au/shop/store/products/jennifer-parkhursts-book-vanishing-icon/

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[2]    Fraser Island Footprints (website), ^http://www.fraserislandfootprints.com/

“It’s the Dingo’s environment, WE are the ones who should be monitored. Please leave them alone, let them live their lives how they should be lived, NOT HALF STARVED. Please go to Fraser Island and look for yourself, then feel what your conscience tells you.”    ~ Australia.

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[3]  ‘Reflections on the Society of Dogs and Men‘, Tuesday, November 8, 2011, in Dog Law Reporter, ^http://doglawreporter.blogspot.com.au/2011/11/canoe-conquests-of-western-pacific-who.html

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[4]   ‘Genetic diversity in the Dingo‘, by Professor Bill Ballard [Head of School], School of Biotechnology and Biomolecular Sciences -Faculty of Science, University of New South Wales, ^http://www.dingosanctuary.com.au/dna.htm

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[5]   ‘Dingos of Fraser Island‘, by John Sinclair, Honorary Project Officer, Fraser Island Defenders Organisation Fraser Island Deferendres Organisation, ^http://www.fido.org.au/moonbi/DingoStory20010502.html,  Website:  ^http://www.fido.org.au/

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[6]  ‘Threatened and Pest Animals of Greater Southern Sydney‘, Chapter 3,  New South Wales Government, Department of Environment (et.al), ^http://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/resources/threatenedspecies/07227tpagssch3pt1.pdf

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[7]   Save the Fraser Island Dingo Inc., ^http://savefraserislanddingoes.com/

“Fraser Island (K’gari) lies off the coast of Queensland, Australia, approx. 200k (120miles) north of Brisbane. It is the largest sand Island in the world. In 1992 it was World Heritage listed by UNESCO because of its natural beauty and unique flora and fauna. The apex predator on the Island is the dingo (canis lupus dingo) and may well be one of the last pure strains of dingo remaining in Australia. The conservation of this gene pool is of national significance.”

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[8]  ‘The great dingo dilution‘, by Steve Davidson, ECOS Magazine, Vol. 118, Jan-Mar 2004, pp. 10-12., ^http://www.ecosmagazine.com/?paper=EC118p10

“Australia’s only wild dog, the iconic dingo, has survived a couple of hundred years of persecution – from shooting, trapping and poisoning. Ironically, it is now at grave risk of disappearing. The greatest threat isn’t so much over-hunting or the usual culprit, habitat destruction; it’s the friendly domestic dog.”     [>Read article  (1140kb)]

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[9]  ‘Pure-bred dingoes might run free on city’s doorstep‘, by James Woodford, 20050903, ^http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/purebred-dingoes-might-run-free-on-citys-doorstep/2005/09/02/1125302746483.html

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[10]  ‘Dingo Attack of unsupervised toddler‘

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A Crimson Rosella (juvenile green plumage)

(Platycercus elegans)

(click photo to enlarge)

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Yesterday was the centenary of the sinking of the Titanic which caused the deaths of 1,514 people at sea.   Last week was Easter.  I am not a religious person, but it is a time of death on the Christian calendar and supposedly a time for resurrection or rebirth.

One morning just before Easter, I went out into the backyard and heard a bird chirping; not unusual as we have many birds in the Blue Mountains.  But the chirping was excited and at ground level coming from the other side of the neighbour’s fence.  I peered over and there he was, a juvenile Crimson Rosella, on the ground in a small depression hobbling around trying to get out.

I knew he was a juvenile because he still had his green winged plumage, whereas adult Crimson Rosellas are a magnificent blue and crimson only.  I knew he was male because he was a large bird, distinctively larger than many Rosellas.  I knew ‘him’, because being large and distinctive from most others, I had noticed him over recent months in our backyard and taking advantage of our bird feeders.  He had become a regular and growing into an adult.

A Crimson Rosella (mature)

[Source: ^http://birdsinbackyards.net/species/Platycercus-elegans]

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Rightly or wrongly we have a bird feeder (or two) and encourage the native birds into our backyard by both having planted many trees and by providing bird seed in bird feeders.  We see Crimson Rosellas (which are parrots), King Parrots and Sulphur-Crested Cockatoos.

Sulphur-crested Cockatoo – a regular in our backyard and apple tree

 

The neighbours were not home, so I grabbed a small cage and put gloves on and went next door to collect the injured Crimson Rosella to take him to the local vet.  When I got close, he chirped frightenedly and tried to evade capture, but he was stuck in the small depression and he could only use one leg.  For some reason he could not fly away, but I couldn’t see anything wrong with his wings. They were folded up on the normal way.

I carefully picked him up and put him in the cage and covered the cage with a towel to quieten him down.  I knew to do this because I am a member of Blue Mountains WIRES (Blue Mountains Wildlife Information, Rescue and Education Service.  I brought the cage inside, placed it carefully on the floor and phoned the rescue hotline.   The bird was happily trying to get out hanging on to the side of the cage.  He seemed happy enough; just needing some expert attention to his leg.

Australian King Parrot

(Alisterus scapularis)

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I phoned WIRES’ hotline and they advised me to take the Rosella to the local veterinary clinic, as this particular vet was registered with WIRES for caring for injured wildlife.

I placed the cage carefully in the car and drove straight to the vet.

Local Vet

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When I arrived, I asked if there was a fee, as I was happy to pay for their services.  I had $150 cash in my pocket just in case. The receptionist explained that there was no charge and that they would examine the leg, X-ray it and keep the bird at the clinic, then contact a WIRES carer to take the bird for rehabiliation until it was fit to return to the wild.  I explained that I would contact them the next day to see how the bird was coming along.  They gave me my cage back and I returned home.

The next morning I phoned the vet as soon as they opened and asked after the Crimson Rosella.  Another receptionist answered the phone.  She told me that they had received four Crimson Rosellas yesterday and that three had been euthanized (killed).

I couldn’t believe it.  I asked specifically about the large green juvenile that I had brought in with only an injured left leg. She said yes that was one of the parrots that they had euthanized.  She gave me some spiel about psitacosis, (parrot beak and feather disease) and then about Crimson Rosellas not being a threatened species anyway.

I said that the bird was quite healthy and vibrant and only had an injured left leg.  The bird was not x-rayed and probably not even tested for psitacosis.  It was convenient to the vet to just kill the wild birds.   I assume the previous receoptionist had not ven xplained that I was happy to pay for the treatment/surgery/whatever to the Crimson Rosella that I had rescued and brought in for care.

I hung up.  I felt terrible and empty.  That bird had entrusted me, yet I had facilitated it’s killing by taking it to this vet, not to be looked after, but to be killed.  This vet played at god.  I have lost trust in this vet.

Garbage skip at rear of vet

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This is the Veterinarian Oath

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“Being admitted to the profession of Veterinary medicine, I solemnly swear to use my scientific knowledge and skills for the benefit of society through the protection of animal health, the relief of animal suffering, the conservation of livestock resources, the promotion of public health, and the advancement of medical knowledge. 

I will practice my profession conscientiously, with dignity and in keeping with the principles of veterinary medical ethics.  I accept as a lifelong obligation, the continual improvement of my professional knowledge and competence.”

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[Source:  ^http://www.equivetaustralia.com/staff.html]

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Clearly a lesser ethical standard applies to animals in comparison to humans under the more stringent Hypocratic Oath…

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Hypocratic Oath (Modern Version)

“I swear to fulfill, to the best of my ability and judgment, this covenant:

I will respect the hard-won scientific gains of those physicians in whose steps I walk, and gladly share such knowledge as is mine with those who are to follow.

I will apply, for the benefit of the sick, all measures [that] are required, avoiding those twin traps of overtreatment and therapeutic nihilism.

I will remember that there is art to medicine as well as science, and that warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon’s knife or the chemist’s drug.

I will not be ashamed to say “I know not”, nor will I fail to call in my colleagues when the skills of another are needed for a patient’s recovery.

I will respect the privacy of my patients, for their problems are not disclosed to me that the world may know. Most especially must I tread with care in matters of life and death. If it is given to me to save a life, all thanks. But it may also be within my power to take a life; this awesome responsibility must be faced with great humbleness and awareness of my own frailty.

Above all, I must not play at God.

I will remember that I do not treat a fever chart, a cancerous growth, but a sick human being, whose illness may affect the person’s family and economic stability. My responsibility includes these related problems, if I am to care adequately for the sick.

I will prevent disease whenever I can, for prevention is preferable to cure.

I will remember that I remain a member of society with special obligations to all my fellow human beings, those sound of mind and body as well as the infirm.

If I do not violate this oath, may I enjoy life and art, be respected while I live and remembered with affection thereafter. May I always act so as to preserve the finest traditions of my calling and may I long experience the joy of healing those who seek my help.”

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[Source:  Hypocratic Oath, 1964, by Dr. Louis Lasagna, former Principal of the Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences and Academic Dean of the School of Medicine at Tufts University, ^http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/body/hippocratic-oath-today.html]

 

Read Also:  Australian Medical Association Code of Ethics   [Read Code]

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But we do play at god, us humans.  We can kill and justify it – birds, animals, other people, for convenience or choice excuse.

Life is very precious and it doesn’t matter whose life it is.  Some religions believe in reincarnations and afterlife.  But to those living we only are sure of the life we have now.  It can end so soon.  Life is so short when one looks back on how quickly it seems to have gone.

Those people on the Titanic who died in the freezing waters shouldn’t have. A few people in charge were playing god recklessly with their lives.  Once a life is gone, it can’t be brought back.

Also on the day of the centenary of the Titanic’s sinking, as it happens, a close friend of ours passed away from a brain tumor.  We had only just seen him in the hospice a few days prior, very aware that it was going to be the last time we would ever see him.   He died on 12th April 2012, coincidently exactly one hundred years after the Titanic sank.  He was just 47 and has left a family behind to fend for themselves fatherless, husbandless.  It is no-one’s fault per se.  Sometimes fate deals randomly to those just going about their lives.  It doesn’t make it right.  Life is so precious but we perhaps take it for granted, especially when we are young , so full of beans and have so much to look forward to.

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Then, after we returned from visiting our friend in the hospice a few days prior, we returned home to find police and forensic officers in ‘The Gully’ nearby.  What was going on?

The police said nothing, but human remains were being gathered from bushland.  The following article sheds some light on the tragic find, but not all is yet known at the time of writing.

Yesterday, a retired Presbyterian minister and I went to inspect the site.  We wanted to understand the death.  The Gully has always felt to be a happy place.  We both felt a sense of sadness about the circumstances of the death.

Blue Mountains Gazette 20120411, p.1
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It was just a clearing in dense bushland.   But there seemed a feeling not of foul play, just of sadness, that a young woman had lost her life there.  It is a calm sheltered spot with dappled sunlight through the trees.   The minister said a prayer. It had been a sad Easter.

Dappled sunlight in a native forest in Ireland

(Photo by Editor)

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‘The village still haunted by its Titanic loss’

[Source:  ‘The village still haunted by its Titanic loss‘, by Sarah Rainey, The Telegraph (UK) – History (tab), 20120411, ^http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/titanic-anniversary/9195690/The-village-still-haunted-by-its-Titanic-loss.html]

Addergoole cemetery, Lahardane

County Mayo, Ireland.

For years, locals refused to talk about the tragedy; now it is marked every year by bell-ringing

Photo: Kim Haunton

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‘High on the hills above the tiny village of Lahardane in County Mayo, a wooden cross juts from a mound of earth towards the sky. The cross sways back and forth, creaking as gales blow across the valley, through what locals call the “Windy Gap”. As I look towards the village on this April morning, a fine mist has settled low on the hillside.

Little has changed in a hundred years. It was from here, in the shadow of the distant crags of Nephin mountain, that the group known as the Addergoole Fourteen had a last glimpse of home as they made the long journey to board the RMS Titanic. Three men and 11 women left the parish of Addergoole that spring morning in 1912. They travelled 19 miles on foot to the nearest station, where they caught a train to Queenstown, County Cork, 16 hours away. There, they joined 111 other passengers who boarded the Titanic in Ireland, a day after it started its maiden voyage from Southampton.

Seventeen-year-old Annie McGowan was accompanying her aunt Catherine to Chicago. In a letter to relatives, she wrote: “I am coming to America on the nicest ship in the world.” Delia McDermott, 31, was moving to Missouri to work as a housemaid. Before she left, her mother bought her a new hat and gloves, so she would “look like a lady” when the Titanic docked in New York.

Four days later, 11 of the Addergoole Fourteen were dead; their bodies lost at sea. Although the remaining three survived, none returned to live in Ireland. The impact on Lahardane was unique: proportionately more people from this tiny village lost their lives on the Titanic than anywhere else in the world. In a population of 200, 11 deaths was more than a tragedy. It ripped the heart out of the community.

For years, locals refused to talk about the Titanic. All this changed in 2002, when villagers started to hold a bell-ringing ceremony, marking the time the Titanic sank into the Atlantic. Every year, at 2.20am on April 15, relatives of the victims chime the church bell – 11 mournful rings followed by three joyous rings – paying their respects to those who never returned.

This year, things are different in Lahardane. As the village prepares to mark 100 years since the tragedy, locals have started to talk publicly about the impact it had on their families’ lives. For the story of the disaster, once too painful to remember, has become Lahardane’s biggest attraction. Tourists are flocking to the remote spot, now signposted “Ireland’s Titanic village”, to learn more about the untold stories of locals on board the ship.

Bridget Donohue was 21 when she left her job in McHale’s shop to set sail for New York. Her third-class ticket cost £7 15s, equivalent to six months’ wages. Before she left, Bridget asked Maura McHale, the seven-year-old daughter of the shop’s owner, if she would like a gift from America. “I’d like a ring,” Maura replied. Bridget measured the girl’s finger with a piece of string, which she put in her pocket and carried on board. Months later, Maura couldn’t understand why she hadn’t received the ring.

Bridget’s nephew, Davie Donoghue, 80 this year, still lives in Lahardane. He is reluctant to talk about the Titanic. “It was five weeks before my father knew his sister had drowned,” he explains. “Her name was printed wrongly in the passenger log – it was down as ‘Burt’, instead of Bridget. They thought she was still alive. Losing her was very emotional.”

McHale’s corner shop, where Bridget worked, is getting a fresh coat of paint this week, along with other buildings that are enjoying a makeover before April 15. A cultural week, with historical re-enactments, has been planned in the village. There’s a new gift shop and a Titanic memorial park with a bronze sculpture shaped like the ship’s bow.

“It only took them 100 years to do the place up,” jokes Donoghue. As one resident says, the “boreens” (narrow tracks) around here don’t know what’s hit them: the past month has seen reporters from as far afield as New York, and television trucks from Brazil and France, trundling through the Windy Gap.

But, behind the Titanic hype, there remains a muted sense of grief; a respect for dead relatives never known. Since childhood, many locals have picked up snippets about the Titanic. They describe listening in at closed doors as older generations grieved.

Vincent O’Callaghan never knew his great aunt, Delia Mahon, who was 20 when she boarded the ship. “I remember my Nana Kate, her sister, crying about it,” he recalls. He treasures a handful of photographs, showing Nana Kate sitting astride a fence with no shoes on. Sadly, there are none of Delia. He has just one memento of his great aunt, from the passenger logs of April 1912: “Miss Bridget Delia Mahon, Ticket No: 330924, Destination: 438 Franklin Avenue, New York”.

According to survivors, Delia was helped into a lifeboat by her neighbour Patrick Canavan, who found a ladder leading from steerage to the upper decks. First, she had to be coaxed out of a cupboard, where she had hidden when she heard the ship was going down. O’Callaghan, 54, says it can be hard to separate fact from folklore. “I’ve heard that her brother Pat read her tea leaves at a party before she left. They spelt out that there would be an accident on the way to America. Delia got angry when Pat told her not to go.”

For local historian Michael Molloy, this anniversary is a chance to learn about the village’s past. “In the early 20th century, around 30,000 Irish emigrants a year left the country to escape extreme poverty,” he explains. The Titanic was one of many such opportunities – the archives of the local Connaught Telegraph show a list of cross-Atlantic liners offering tickets.

As a child, Molloy met Annie Kate Kelly, one of three Addergoole passengers who escaped the Titanic. She became a nun in Michigan but returned home in the 1950s to visit her family. She flew to Ireland – none of the local survivors would travel by ship again. Annie Kate’s memories of what happened on the ship have become symbolic to the residents of Lahardane, who used her account to commission a stained-glass memorial window for St Patrick’s Church.

Inside the church, sunlight streams through the coloured panes, casting a kaleidoscopic glow over the pews. The scene, entitled “Titanic Rescue”, shows a small girl being lowered from the ship in Lifeboat 16. She looks up at grief-stricken figures on the deck above, wailing and clutching rosary beads as they pray to be saved.

Little else is known about the Addergoole group’s final hours on the Titanic. April 14 was 22-year-old Nora Fleming’s birthday, and a survivor from nearby County Sligo remembers hearing singing and dancing down in third class. Nora, she recalls, was a beautiful singer. They may still have been celebrating at 11.40pm, when the ship collided with the iceberg – and perhaps even at 12.05am, when the first lifeboats were lowered. Nora’s nephew, 71-year-old John Lynn, says her loss left his mother devastated. “She never talked about it; not to the day she died.”

Nora’s relatives waited weeks for confirmation from White Star Line, the company that owned the Titanic, that she had drowned. Her name still appears incorrectly in the passenger lists as Norah Hemming.

This centenary year, members of the Addergoole Titanic Society will gather by candlelight in the small churchyard. They will ring the bell and lay a wreath, before heading to nearby Murphy’s pub to share stories until sunrise. One bell-ringer is Willie Cussack, 78, the second-cousin of Annie McGowan. It was Cussack’s uncle Peter who took Annie and her aunt Catherine to the railway station at the start of their journey to America. Annie survived the tragedy but Catherine, 42, drowned after they became separated.

“When he talked, you could see the sadness in his face; his eyes would well up with tears,” Cussack says of his uncle. For Cussack, the bell-ringing is a particularly poignant tribute to Lahardane’s Titanic victims. Years ago, he remembers hearing a boy crying as he cycled through the Addergoole hills; this is how he imagines the cries of grief in 1912 when locals found out their loved ones had died. For him, this is what the bell-ringing represents.

“Do you know what an echo sounds like in these mountains?” he asks, pointing towards the craggy hills. “The cry is gone and it comes back and it is all around you, all over the village. I can imagine the way it echoed across the bog lands that morning. When we hear the bell ringing in the church, we imagine just a tiny piece of what they went through.

It’s the most haunting sound you will ever hear.”

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Footnote

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A week after posting this article, the local paper The Blue Mountains Gazette published information about the human remains found in The Gully (20120418, page 3)…

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Some wee satire from Tigerquoll, fed up with Tasmania’s dark reality…  [This was initially posted as a comment by Tigerquoll  on Tasmanian Times 20120311 to an article entitled ‘Duck rescuers set to join the frontline’, ^http://tasmaniantimes.com/index.php?/weblog/article/duck-rescuers-set-to-join-the-frontline/show_comments/

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Queenstown Moonscape Tours – once was temperate rainforest

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A wee ‘tea and scones’ tourism boom could be encouraged in Tasmania, treating visitors to Tasmanian reality art exhibitions – with themes such as:

‘Convict Tourism’ – Cannibal Alexander Pearce at it, days in the life at Maria Island, Cascades, Port Arthur, Martin Bryant’s gun collection, Risdon’s worst.

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‘Ecoterrorism Tourism’ – See Forestry Tasmania at it in the Florentine Valley, See Stihl at work felling old growth, take Clearfell Tours, watch the wildlife scurry, see a ‘Scorched Earthing‘ photographic exhibition.

Watch loggers Rodney Howells, Jeremy Eizell and Terrence Pearce ecoterrorism videos:  Sample video below on 21st October 2008, shows these Tasmanian loggers attacking two young forest defenders in a car, using sledge hammers.  [^Read More]

WARN­ING ! THIS FOOTAGE CONTAINS STRONG LANGUAGE AND MAY BE DIS­TRESS­ING   

(Turn sound up)

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‘Grenade Fishing’ – see it demonstrated on Tasmania’s Penstock Lagoon, now that petrol outboards are banned.

‘Wildlife Bagging’  – see the live action on Tasmania’s Moulting Lagoon – Black Swans and Pied Oystercatchers – shot plucked and gutted. Fun for all the family!

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[Source:  ^http://www.smh.com.au/environment/tasmania-kicks-off-duck-hunting-20090305-8pdc.html]

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[Source: ^http://www.aact.org.au/ducks.htm]

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‘Mutton birding’ Tourism – Visit Flinders Island. Watch them rip the native Short-tailed Shearwater chicks out from their burrows and throttle their necks – give it a go yourself – it’s easy!

[Source:  Gourmet Farmer 6th October, Flinders Island, Series 2, Episode 7, SBS Television]

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“Hi Everyone,  Just a quick reminder that mutton bird season is open from the 2nd April 2011 until 17th April 2011 on Flinders Island…

Just remember if you don’t have a mutton birding licence then please visit your nearest Service Tasmania Shop or their website to obtain one. A mutton birding licence will set you back $27.20 for a full fee or $21.75 of a concession fee.”

[Source:   Flinders Island Car Rentals, ^http://www.ficr.com.au/news/category/birds-found-on-flinders-island/]

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Or try Flinders Island Wallaby…”Bennetts Wallaby and Pademelon Wallaby are found in large numbers on the Island. The gathering of wallabies are restricted on a quota basis that is reviewed annually and is independent of market demand.”  [Source:  ^http://www.flindersislandmeat.com.au/]

 

Bennetts Wallaby

Native to Tasmania and surrounding islands such as Flinders Island

[Source:  ^http://www.davidcook.com.au/images/images_mammals/bennetts_wallaby.jpg]

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“Native animals are considered pests by the Tasmanian rural community and their control a wasteful cost.   Lenah Game Meats of Tasmania..”is attempting to turn this situation around so that with time and market development it is hoped the rural community will come to see the animals adapted to the Australian landscape as ‘friends’ rather than foe….Lenah were the first people to harvest and process wallaby and market it to the restaurant trade.”   [^Read More]

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‘1080’ Poison Tours – how it works, watch it in action, proof exhibits, discount taxidermy home delivered

This photo is taken from the main road down to Cockle Creek, at the start of
the South Coast Walking Track.
[Source; ^http://www.discover-tasmania.com/photo2.html]

 

‘Queenstown Memories’ – Mount Lyell moonscape tours, Queen River cruises, spot the three eyed fish games, sample Macquarie Harbour cuisine

See the copper flows in the once pristine Queen and King Rivers

If the copper doesn’t kill you, then the cadmium, lead, cobalt, silver or chromium will.

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‘Self-drive Tourism’ – play ‘I spy with my little eye’, or ‘count the roadkill’, or dodge the log trucks

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Photo taken by Editor while driving along the Tasman Highway, Tasmania 20110927, free in public domain

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Cape Grim Heritage Tourism – discover its namesake (massacre of Tasmanian Aborigines on 10th February 1828) – learn about early colonial hunting.  [^Read More]

‘Burn offs by Air’ – see the smoke by air

‘Tassie Holes’ – see the mines by air

‘Scarefaces by Air’ – see the native forest clearfells by air

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All such Tasmanian Reality Tourism can be delivered direct from the window, and what better than with home made piping hot Tassie tea and scones!

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“The Styx State Forest will continue to be sustainably managed, providing the public with Australia’s finest timbers, protection for Tasmania’s unique biodiversity, and a popular recreation resource.   Tours of the surrounding forests are available from the Maydena Adventure Hub.”

~ Forestry Tasmania

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Wilfred Batty of Mawbanna, Tasmania, with the last Tasmanian Tiger known to have been shot in the wild.

He shot the tiger in May, 1930 after it was discovered in his hen house.

Source: State Library of Tasmania eHeritage

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RMS policy:      More trucking expressways > bigger faster trucks > more carnage

 

Mar 2012:  ‘Driver fined after allegedly driving b-double truck 30kmh over the speed limit – Mittagong’

[Source: ^http://www.police.nsw.gov.au  (media release) ]

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‘A man has been fined after being stopped by police for allegedly speeding in the state’s Southern Highlands.

About 5.44am yesterday (Monday 5 March 2012), police were patrolling the (6-laned) Hume Highway at Mittagong, when they allegedly detected a white B-double (truck) travelling at a speed of 142kph in an 110kmh zone.  They stopped the vehicle a short distance away and issued the 41-year-old male driver with a traffic infringement for exceed speed over 30km/h.

The fine for the offence is $1112.

[Ed:  A poultry slap on the wrist fine?   When 60+ tonnes is hurtling along the road at 142kph, how is this not attempted murder?]

Killer on the Road

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Mar 2012:  ‘Fatal head-on in NSW’   (south of Oberon)

[Source:  ‘Fatal head-on in NSW’, bigpondnews, Saturday, March 31, 2012, ^http://bigpondnews.com/articles/National/2012/03/31/Fatal_head-on_in_NSW_734843.html]

‘A truck driver has been killed, and three men have been airlifted to hospital, after two trucks collided head-on near Oberon, west of Sydney.

Police say the Isuzu table top truck and Mack prime mover logging truck crashed on Abercrombie Road, at Black Springs just before midnight (AEDT).

The Isuzu driver, aged in his 30s, died at the scene.  Two other men inside suffered head and chest injuries, while the driver of the other truck, aged in his 60s, has an injury to his leg.   Abercrombie Road is expected to remain closed until around 7am (AEDT).’

Typical prime mover logging truck (empty)

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Jul 2009:  Recall the fatal truck crash east of Oberon three years ago…

[Source: ‘Man killed in truck crash‘, by Brendan Arrow, Western Advocate, 20090708, ^http://www.westernadvocate.com.au/news/local/news/general/man-killed-in-truck-crash/1561790.aspx]

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‘One man died and another was airlifted to a Sydney hospital after a car and truck crashed head-on near Oberon yesterday afternoon.

Emergency services received reports about 1.12pm of a car hitting a truck on the Duckmaloi Road near Fearndale Road on the Sydney side of Oberon.  Ambulance officers arrived and began treating the men involved in the accident. The passenger of the car was declared dead at the scene.

The 20-year-old male driver of the car was airlifted to Westmead Hospital with multiple fractures to his legs, arms and chest as well as head injuries.  The truck driver was assessed by ambulance officers and did not require hospitalisation.  Late last night the Duckmaloi Road was still close to non-residential traffic as spilt fuel and debris was cleaned from the site.

An Oberon trucker driver, who wished to remain anonymous, later said the Duckmaloi Road needed to be seriously looked at due to the large amount of traffic it carried.

“Along with the Bathurst road it is one of the two main veins into Oberon,” he said.  “I believe around 200 trucks a day would use that road to get from Oberon to Sydney and back again.”

The truck driver added that for people who did not frequently use the Duckmaloi Road it could be very dangerous.  “It can be bloody treacherous if you don’t know it,” he said.

“In one day I think we send about 50 trucks out and have 50 trucks come back in on it [the Duckmaloi Road].  “If you also add in the log trucks and the chip trucks than you would easily have 200 trucks a day on that road.”

[Ed:  Two years later, $395,000 from the Australia Government went into widening the Duckmaloi Road.  ^Read More]

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Fatal truck head-on near Oberon, NSW (2009)

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2012:  Great Western Highway – Wentworth Falls East ‘trucking upgrade’

No 1 Feature:   “Widening the highway to four lanes with sealed shoulders“!

No 1 Benefit:    “Quicker journeys –  in the region and to Sydney“!

Great Western Highway being widened to a faster 4-lane trucking expressway
[Source:  RMS, ^http://www.rta.nsw.gov.au/roadprojects/projects/great_western_hway/ww_falls/index.html]

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Mar 2012:  ‘Delays at Marulan after truck crash’

[Source: ‘Delays at Marulan after truck crash‘, 20120327, ^http://www.fullyloaded.com.au/industry-news/articleid/78790.aspx]

Four laned Hume Highway built for faster, bigger trucks – not safer.

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‘Delays are expected today on a section of the Hume Highway in NSW after a crash involving two trucks near Marulan.  NSW Police says a B-double carrying furniture rolled about 5km south of Marulan at 12.45am, spilling its load and blocking all northbound lanes. A semi-trailer travelling behind crashed into the rear of the truck…’

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Jul 2011:  Near the same spot a year before..’Fatal crash near Marulan’

[Source: ‘Fatal crash near Marulan’, by David Butler and NSW Police Media, 20110729, ^http://www.goulburnpost.com.au/news/local/news/general/fatal-crash-near-marulan/2242199.aspx]

Star Express B-Double crashed solo into this gully just after midnight

The driver’s dead – fell asleep or heart attack at the wheel?

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‘A report will be prepared for the coroner following a fatal highway crash near Marulan in the early hours of the morning.

About 12.45am this morning a B-double truck travelling north on the Hume Highway left the road and plunged into a deep roadside gully, rolling on to its side and taking out trees and a 10-meter section of guard rail in the process.  The cause of the crash is still unknown and police investigations are continuing. No one else was injured in the crash.

The driver, a 47-year-old man from Glenfield, suffered severe injuries and died at the scene. He was travelling from Albury to Sydney when the accident occurred approximately 15km north of Goulburn.

[Ed:  All night 60+ tonne all night bats out of hell and 60+ tonne all night zombies being driven to death by greedy retailers demanding pre-dawn delivery times.  Overnight linehaul is al about unnatural sleep depravation.  It is death waiting to happen.  Driving on Australian highways aafter midnight has become Russian Roulette death wish to all road users.  Meanwhile,  Australian Truckers Association chairman David Simon says the government should also be encouraging more “AB-triples” — which are 51m long — and “BAB-quads”, which are two connected B-doubles.”  [Read More]

Why have railway tracks, when trucking companies keep adding carriages and ring feeders?

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Mar 2012:    B-Double truckers tampering with speed governors

[Source:  ‘Police blitz on trucks widens’, by AAP, 20120307, ^http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/article/2012/03/07/453455_machine.html]

“Faster, faster..you’re a good operator!”

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‘New South Wales police have seized two South Australian trucks as part of a crackdown on unsafe practices in the road transport industry.  Officers in NSW had intercepted 13 trucks from Scott’s Transport Industries as of today in a nationwide blitz on the Mt Gambier-based firm, which operates a fleet of 322 trucks and is suspected of serious safety breaches.

NSW police launched Operation Overland after one of the company’s B-doubles was detected travelling at 142kph on Monday.

An analysis of the company’s trucks’ movements has shown speeding by 32 of them.

Superintendent Stuart Smith said the two trucks were stopped after being identified as having defects, but it was too early to say if the defects were the result of tampering.

He said more of the company’s vehicles would be targeted for interception and comprehensive mechanical inspections.

“It’s not the 300, but it’s a large number,” Superintendent Smith said.  “There’s a large number to go and the operation will continue for a number of days.”

Further actions by NSW Roads and Maritime Services will likely lead to a prosecution and significant fines.

Premier Barry O’Farrell said transport companies had been warned checks would become more regular. “Trucking companies should understand that what was then unprecedented action would become more regular if we had suspicions that there were cowboys driving trucks across the state’s roads, that it was likely to cause safety concerns for motorists,” Mr O’Farrell told reporters in Sydney.

Police have said an investigation of Lennons Transport Services, based in Sydney’s inner west, found eight trucks had been tampered with, including seven that had been modified to exceed the maximum speed of 100km/h.  They have also charged a Lennons’ driver with dangerous driving causing the deaths of three members of one family on January 24.

Calvyn Logan, 59, and his elderly parents Donald and Patricia Logan, in their 80s, were killed when a Lennons‘ B-double truck careered onto the wrong side of the Hume Highway, near Menangle in southwest Sydney.

B-double truck driver Vincent Samuel George (33) killed three members of one family with his B-Double.

Court records also revealed that between 1998 and last year, George had his licence suspended five times and he has been convicted of 17 offences, including speeding and drink driving.

[^http://www.truckinlife.com.au/articles/2012/truck-collision-menangle-bridge]

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Police allege the driver’s truck had been tampered with to make it go faster.

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The RMS has also filed a series of summons in the NSW Supreme Court relating to driver fatigue at South Penrith Sand and Soil.

RMS alleges a series of offences relating to drivers’ work hours, rest hours and fatigue management. A cyclist was killed and three were injured after a truck driver working for the company veered into a breakdown lane and hit them on the M4 motorway on April 10, 2010.

The driver pleaded guilty last week to manslaughter.

Sydney’s M4:   this is supposedly an RMS cycle lane

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Recall, RMS  ‘upgrade features‘ at its Great Western Highway Wentworth Falls East section include:

“Improved cyclist access and safety – access for commuter and long distance cyclists will be provided by a 2.5 metre shoulder between Nelson and Dalrymple avenues.”

[Source:  ^http://www.rta.nsw.gov.au/roadprojects/projects/great_western_hway/ww_falls/features_benefits.html]

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Try riding a bicycle through the Leura section, just up the Great Western Highway from Wentworth Falls

Spot the cycle lane…Russian Roulette anyone?

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Great Western Highway – being transformed into a trucking expressway

so that bigger and more trucks can travel faster, all night long.

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Trucking Expressways are the antithesis of road safety

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Mar 2012:   ‘Twelve more trucks had speeds tampered’

[Source: ‘Twelve more trucks had speeds tampered‘, SkyNews, 20120310, ^http://www.skynews.com.au/local/article.aspx?id=727226&vId=]

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Another 12 trucks have been discovered with tampered speed limiters during a two-state police probe into dodgy practices (Ed: read ‘criminally culpable‘) in the industry.

Police inspecting Lennons Transport Services B-Double truck

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‘Operation Overland’

Operation Overland was launched into Scott’s Transport Industries on Monday.  Ninety-eight of the South Australian transport company’s fleet of 322 heavy vehicles have since been intercepted for mechanical inspection.

On Thursday, police said they had found six trucks with tampered speed limiters.  A day later, 12 more had been discovered, taking the total to 18.

Overall, 71 offences have been identified, including two trucks found to be overloaded.

Almost 70 defect notices have been issued.   The probe into Scott’s Transport Industries began after one of its drivers was clocked travelling at 142km/h on the Hume Highway at Mittagong about 5.45am (AEDT) on Monday.

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Earlier this year, police swooped on Lennons Transport Services, in Sydney’s inner-west, where they discovered eight tampered trucks, including seven modified to exceed the 100km/h maximum.

Police Blitz at Lennons Transport Services

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It came after a Lennons driver was charged with dangerous driving causing the deaths of Calvyn Logan, 59, and his elderly parents Donald and Patricia Logan, in their 80s.

The truckie’s B-double allegedly careered onto the wrong side of the Hume Highway near Menangle and crashed into the trio’s car.

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Feb 2011:  ‘Man dies after trucks collide on Hume Freeway, Baddaginnie’

[Source:  ‘Man dies after trucks collide on Hume Freeway, Baddaginnie‘, by Jessica Craven, Herald Sun, February 15, 20110215,  ^http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/man-dies-after-trucks-collide-on-hume-freeway-baddaginnie/story-e6frf7kx-1226006057102]

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Six-laned Hume Freeway – the wider and faster the expressway…

All night trucking zombies

[Photo: Jon Hargest, Herald Sun]

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‘A man has died following a collision between two trucks on the Hume Freeway in Baddaginnie (Ed: Victoria, just south of the NSW border) just after midnight.

It’s believed one driver lost control of his truck which rolled onto the freeway moments before a second truck collided with it at 12.08am.

The driver of the second truck died and police are investigating the cause of the collision.  The identity of the dead man is yet to be established.

The Hume Freeway is closed northbound at Violet Town and diversions are in place.’

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Comments:

Patrick of Rooney (20110215):

“Wake up and sip the coffee Victoria! We need thousands more speed cameras out there!”

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Andrew of Flemington (20110215):

“Worksafe Victoria, where are you?? Another tragic death caused by unsafe work practices. How many more deaths and injuries must occur before you finally step in?

.

Feb 2011:   ‘Logging truck driver kills car driver stopped at traffic lights outside Bathurst’

[Source:  ‘One killed in truck crash‘, by Jo Johnson, Western Advocate, 20110201, ^http://www.westernadvocate.com.au/news/local/news/general/one-killed-in-truck-crash/2062626.aspx]

Media news often doesn’t travel outside one’s local area,

so other Australians don’t realise the extent of the trucking carnage being inflicted across the country.

.

Who says truck drivers are ‘professionals’?

.

‘A 59-year-old local man is dead and two others seriously injured after a truck ploughed into three cars stopped at roadworks traffic lights on the O’Connell Road yesterday.  The tragedy occurred at lunchtime, about 15 kilometres south of Bathurst.

Emergency services rushed to the scene to find people trapped in their cars.  The road was immediately closed to traffic in both directions.  Initial investigations have revealed that an unladen logging truck struck the vehicles, which were all making their way towards Bathurst at the time.

Police, ambulance and fire and rescue crews were called to the crash site at about 12.30pm.  An air ambulance helicopter landed on the road near the accident to provide additional assistance.

Bathurst police Inspector Ross Wilkinson confirmed the driver of a red Toyota Camry died at the scene. He was a 59-year-old male from the O’Connell region.

The logging truck was travelling north when it slammed into the rear of the Toyota Camry, killing the man and seriously injuring a female passenger.

The driver of the next car in line, a silver Mazda Astina, was also in a serious condition yesterday afternoon, while the driver of a bronze Holden Rodeo was taken to Bathurst Base Hospital for observation.

Inspector Wilkinson said Chifley Local Area Command’s crash investigation unit attended the scene and investigations into the fatality would continue.  The driver of the logging truck was uninjured and is helping police with their inquiries.

Traffic was diverted via Brewongle and The Lagoon and drivers heading to Oberon from Bathurst late yesterday afternoon were advised to divert at Hartley via Jenolan Caves Road.

The roadworks were being carried out by the NSW Roads and Traffic Authority (Ed: recently rebranded ‘RMS’) , between the Wests Lane turn-off to Brewongle and Ridge Road.

.

Feb 2010:  ‘Speeding B-Double Blayney Cattle Truck Rolls Over – kills/maims 21 cattle’

[Source: ‘Speeding B-Double Blayney Cattle Truck Accident 2-6-2010‘, by Clare Colley,  20100603, ^http://www.canobolas.rfs.nsw.gov.au/dsp_content.cfm?cat_id=131092]

Injured cattle shot after speeding cattle truck overturned on bend near Blayney (Central NSW)

.

Traffic between Blayney and Bathurst was detoured through Millthorpe yesterday after a semi-trailer cattle truck overturned while negotiating a sharp left bend about three kilometres out of Blayney.

Drivers on the Mid Western Highway had to slow to avoid runaway cattle after the accident on the outskirts of Blayney shortly after 11am.

Inspector Ross Wilkinson from Chifley Area Command said that police were continuing their investigations into the cause of the accident that disrupted highway traffic for four hours and killed 21 of the 96 cattle on board the truck.

“Police will issue an infringement notice to the truck driver at a later stage,” he said.  “It’s a timely reminder for drivers to take care when driving in the changing weather conditions.”   [Ed:  Yet another dangerous coyboy truckie gets but a slap on the wrist.  The driver deserves a custodial sentence for recklessly causing pain and suffering to the cattle, and barred from cattle truck driving for life].

.

The road between Bathurst and Blayney was closed for 30 minutes while cranes were brought in to lift the truck back onto the road.  RTA workers, who were among the first at the accident scene, began directing traffic and slowing motorists down to avoid the cattle before police arrived.

“We’ve been trying to keep things flowing,” one RTA worker said.  “A couple of steers got away but they’ve pretty well got them under control.”

Blayney Shire Council overseer, Paul Wade, said that Blayney Shire Council staff were working with the RTA to divert Bathurst bound traffic through Millthorpe.  Mr Wade said that council staff worked with the emergency services and the truck’s driver to help control the traffic and move the surviving cattle into a nearby paddock. The council’s ranger euthanized a number of cattle at the scene…

Yesterday’s accident is the second time a semi-trailer has overturned on the same winding stretch of road on the outskirts of Blayney in recent months.  On January 28 traffic on the highway was disrupted for four hours when a semi-trailer travelling towards Blayney overturned while negotiating a left bend near yesterday’s accident scene.

 

Play Video (Prime News):

Click image to play video

(when running, double click on video to enlarge)

NB.  The Rural Fire Service at Canobolas have since deleted the above video, so here is one from Channel 9:

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Oct 2010:   ‘Truckie’s death adds to road toll’

[Source:  ‘Truckie’s death adds to road toll’, by Dominic Zietsch, Daily Examiner, 20101004, ^http://www.dailyexaminer.com.au/story/2010/10/04/truckies-death-horrific-road-toll/]

 

All night truck driving solo – another dead truck driver

The driver of this B-Double was killed when it hit an embankment on the Pacific Highway near Corindi (Ed: north of Coffs Harbour) on Friday night

[Photo by Frank Reward]

.

A man was killed in an horrific crash near Dirty Creek, west of Corindi, on Friday night in what is amounting to a horror weekend on NSW roads.

A B-Double being driven by the 48-year-old man, from Queensland, had been travelling south on the Pacific Highway when it appears to have left the road and crashed into an embankment.

According to a police statement, police and emergency services were called to the crash just after 11pm where the driver, the sole occupant of the truck, had suffered serious injuries and died at the scene.  According to the statement, the impact of the crash had detached the two trailers from the prime mover, but no further details were available last night…

This crash adds another death to the mounting NSW road toll with the number rising to eight since the start of the long weekend, five more than for the same long weekend last year.

.

Mar 2007:  Hume Highway again.. ‘head-on truck crash kills driver’

[Source:  ‘Head-on truck crash kills driver‘, Sydney Morning Herald, 20070316, ^http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/headon-truck-crash-kills-driver/2007/03/16/1173722699803.html]

B-Double Head On – after driving all night?

.

A fatal truck crash has closed the Hume Highway near Coolac, in southern NSW.  Two trucks collided head-on on the highway, sparking fires in both cabs, about 6.15am (AEDT) today, police said.   The driver of a semi-trailer, carrying groceries north on the highway, died at the scene after rescue efforts failed to save him.  The driver of a southbound truck, carrying metal, escaped with minor injuries…

.

Ed:  The Truck Menace is blatantly out of control.  ‘Industry self-regulation’ never works and is nothing but a costing cutting government cop out.  Meanwhile Australian Liberal Labor governments continue to pour billions of taxpayers’s money into building bigger and faster dedicated trucking expressways.  And so the trucks get bigger and faster and Australia’s highway carnage of families continues unabated…

.

Watch video:

(includes sound)

.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=dvH3XnSNE9s

.

.

Postcript:

.

Well we didn’t have to wait bloody long.   The day after posting this article there was another B-double multiple fatality…dead driver, dead and maimed cattle under his care…

.

Speeding truckie hooning a fully laden B-Double cattle truck, loses it on bend – kills himself and the cattle

Carnage at Tangaratta Creek yesterday

.

[Source:  ‘Truckie killed: B-double rolls near Tamworth‘, by Haley Sheridan, Northern Daily Leader newspaper, 20120403, ^http://www.northerndailyleader.com.au/news/local/news/general/truckie-killed-bdouble-rolls-near-tamworth/2509357.aspx]

.

‘A salvage operation continued into last night to remove a laden cattle truck that crashed into the Tangaratta Creek Bridge near Tamworth yesterday, claiming the life of the driver.

Oxley Highway was closed for hours as emergency crews worked at the scene, first freeing the driver’s body from the truck’s cabin, which had been crushed against the bridge pylons, and then removing dead cattle and the truck from the scene.

An unknown number of cattle were killed or injured and diesel fuel from a ruptured fuel tank leaked into the creek. [‘”65 head of cattle ‘..according to SkyNews ^http://www.skynews.com.au/topstories/article.aspx?id=735717&vId=]

The B-double truck left the road and rolled at the bridge on the Oxley Highway, about 10km west of the city, about 3pm.  Police believe the truck was travelling south, bound for Cargill abattoir at Tamworth, when it lost control on a sweeping bend that has been the scene of  other serious accidents over the years.  [Sky News:  Police said the vehicle failed to negotiate a right-hand bend near Tangaratta Bridge, causing it to roll down an embankment.]

An off-duty police officer was first on the scene.

.

Police officers euthanased distressed cattle that had been crushed or injured in the trailers, which rested on their sides near the creek.

.

Oxley Local Area Command duty officer, Inspector Jeff Budd, said the recovery effort was expected to continue late into last night.  He said firefighters had set up booms to contain the diesel spill in the creek.

…Yesterday’s fatal crash happened at the same bridge where a horrific bus accident occurred on January 5, 1992, claiming the lives of five people.   A double-decker Pioneer bus en route from Brisbane to Melbourne slammed into the bridge on a Saturday night.  The crash claimed the lives of an eight-year-old girl, as well as three women and a man.

Inspector Budd said police were continuing their investigations into the cause of yesterday’s crash and a report would be prepared for the coroner.’

.

Meanwhile pig carcasses have been scattered over a motorway in Sydney’s southwest after two trucks collided early today.  Police say the heavy vehicles crashed shortly after 2am on the M7 westlink motorway at Prestons, near the Bernera Road off-ramp.  The truck carrying the pig carcasses rolled, throwing the meat all over the road.

Pig carcasses picked up off M7

http://www.skynews.com.au/national/article.aspx?id=735802&vId=

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[Source:   ‘Driver, dozens of cows die in truck crash‘, 20120403, ^http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/driver-dozens-of-cows-die-in-truck-crash-20120403-1w9ba.html]

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This article was initially written by this editor and published in the Blue Mountains Gazette newspaper on 20051005 as a letter to the editor, entitled ‘RFS strategy misguided‘.

.

19th Century heritage-listed ‘Six Foot Track’

..bulldozed by the Rural Fire Service in July 2005, widened into a convenient Fire Trail for its fire truck crews.

.
It has been revealed that the June bulldozing or grading of the Six Foot Track near Megalong Creek (Blue Mountains, New South Wales) was a mere drop in the Rural Fire Service (RFS) Bushfire Mitigation Programme.

Across the Blue Mountains, some twenty natural reserves including the Six Foot Track were targeted under the RFS 2004-05 Fire Trail Strategy:

• Edith Falls
• McMahons Point
• Back Creek
• Cripple Creek
• Plus some 95 hectares inside the Blue Mountains National Park.

.

Read: [>RFS Fire Trail Policy]

Read: [>RFS Fire Trail Classification Guidelines]

.

According to the Australian Government’s (then) Department of Transport and Regional Services (DOTARS) website, some $151,195 was granted to the RFS in the Blue Mountains alone, for it to bulldoze and burn 144 hectares of native bushland under the euphemism of “addressing bushfire mitigation risk priorities”  (Ed: Read ‘bush arson‘) 

‘The Six Foot Track Conservation and Management Plan 1997, Vol II’ lists numerous vulnerable species of fauna recorded near Megalong Creek – the Glossy Black-Cockatoo (Clyptorhynchus lathami), Giant Burrowing Frog (Heleioporus australiacus), Spotted-tailed Quoll (Dasyurus maculatus).

Glossy Black-Cockatoo

[Source: Dubbo Field Naturalist & Conservation Society
http://www.speednet.com.au/~abarca/black-cockatoo.htm]

.

Giant Burrowing Frog

[Source:  Frogs.org.au, ^http://frogs.org.au/community/viewtopic.php?t=4876&sid=0dc45ef08e12cd5e1d27524bca2269f9]

.

Spotted-tailed Quoll

(Dasyurus maculatus)

Blue Mountains top order predator, competing with the Dingo

.

The RFS contractors wouldn’t have had a clue if they were within 100 metres or 1 metre of rare, vulnerable or threatened species.

The RFS is not exempt from destroying important ecological habitat; rather it is required to have regard to the principles of Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD).

Read: >RFS Policy 2-03 Ecologically Sustainable Development

.

The ‘Rationale‘ of this RFS ESD policy states at Clause 1.2:

‘The Bush Fire Coordinating Committee, under the Rural Fires Act 1997 Sec 3 (d), is required to have regard to ESD as outlined in the Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1991, which sets out the following principles:

a)   The precautionary principle namely, that if there are threats of serious or irreversible environmental damage, lack of full scientific certainty should not be used as a reason for postponing measures to prevent environmental degradation. In the application of the precautionary principle, public and private decisions should be guided by:

i.   careful evaluation to avoid, wherever practicable, serious or irreversible damage to the environment, and
ii.   an assessment of the risk-weighted consequences of various options.

.

b)   Inter-generational equity namely, that the present generation should ensure that the health, diversity and productivity of the environment are maintained or enhanced for the benefit of future generations

.

.

c)   Conservation of biological diversity and ecological integrity should be a fundamental consideration in all decisions.

.

d)   Recognising the economic values that the natural environment provides. The natural environment has values that are often hard to quantify but provide a benefit to the entire community. By recognising that the natural environment does have significant economic and social values we can improve decision making for the present and future generations.’

.

.

Yet the RFS policy on hazard reduction is woefully loose in the ‘Bushfire Co-ordinating Committee Policy 2 /03 on ESD‘ – which (on paper) advocates protecting environmental values and ensuring that ESD commitments are adopted and adhered to by contractors.

Experience now confirms this policy is nothing more than ‘greenwashing’.  The RFS wouldn’t know what environmental values were if they drove their fire truck into a Blkue Mountains upland swamp.  There is not one ecologist among them.

While the critical value of dedicated RFS volunteer fire-fighters fighting fires is without question, what deserves questioning is the unsustainable response of the RFS ‘old guard’ to fire trails and hazard reduction with token regard for sensitive habitat.  Repeated bushfire research confirms that bushfires are mostly now caused by:

1. Bush arson (hazard reduction included, escaped or otherwise)
2. More residential communities encroaching upon bushland.

.

Under the ‘Blue Mountains Bushfire Management Committee Bushfire Risk Management Plan’ (Ed: their bureaucratic name), key objectives are patently ignored:

• ‘Ensure that public and private land owners and occupiers understand their bushfire management responsibilities’
• ‘Ensure that the community is well informed about bushfire protection measures and prepared for bushfire events through Community Fireguard programs’
• ‘Manage bushfires for the protection and conservation of the natural, cultural, scenic and recreational features , including tourism values, of the area’.

.

Instead, the Rural Fire Service is content to look busy by burning and bulldozing native bushland.  The RFS actively demonises native vegetation as a ‘fuel hazard‘, in the much the same way that ignorant colonists of the 18th and 19th centuries demonised Australia’s unique wildlife as ‘vermin‘ and ‘game‘.

.

Further Reading:

.

[1]   Previous article on The Habitat Advocate:  ‘RFS Bulldozes Six Foot Track‘  (published 20101220):  [>Read Article]

.

[2]  Tip of the Bush-Arson Iceberg

What these government funded and State-sanctioned bush-arsonists get up to, deliberately setting fire to wildlife habitat, is an ecological disgrace.

The following list is from just 2005 of the vast areas of native vegetation deliberately burnt across New South Wales in just this one year.  [Source: DOTARS].

Not surprisingly, this State-sanctioned bush-arson information is no longer published by government each year for obvious clandestine reasons, as the bush-arson continues out of the public eye.

The hazard reduction cult is similarly perpetuated across other Australian states – Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, West Australia as well as Northern Territory and the ACT.   No wonder Australia’s record of wildlife extinctions tragically leads the world!  There is little precious rich wildlife habitat left.

.

National Park and Wildlife Service  (NSW) Bush Arson:

(Note: ‘NR’ = Nature Reserve, ‘NP’ = National Park, ‘SCA’ = State Conservation Area… as if these bastards care)

Reserve / Activity Name	Treatment Area (km2)
Baalingen NR	5
Baalingen NR	6
Bald Rock NP	7
Banyabba NR	0.5
BANYABBA NR	3
BANYABBA NR	24
BANYABBA NR	8
Barakee NP	6
Barool NP	20
Barool NP	6
Barool NP	5
Barool NP	4
Barool NP	2
Barool NP	5
Barrington Tops NP	2.5
Barrington Tops NP	2
Barrington Tops NP	6
Barrington Tops NP	18
Barrington Tops NP	6
Barrington Tops NP	16
Barrington Tops NP	11
Barrington Tops NP	1
Barrington Tops NP	4
Barrington Tops NP	2
Barrington Tops NP	1
Barrington Tops NP	3
Basket Swamp NP	1
Basket Swamp NP	12
Basket Swamp NP	2
Basket Swamp NP	4
Bellinger River NP	1
Ben Boyd NP	0.8
Ben Boyd NP	3
Ben Boyd NP	0.9
Ben Boyd NP	0.9
Ben Boyd NP	5
Ben Boyd NP	13
Ben Boyd NP	5
Ben Boyd NP	0.4
Ben Boyd NP	1
Ben Boyd NP	2
Ben Boyd NP	3
Ben Boyd NP	5
Ben Boyd NP	3.6
Ben Boyd NP	1.9
Ben Boyd NP	1.6
Ben Halls Gap NP	3
Bindarri NP	2
Black Bulga SCA	8
Black Bulga SCA	12
Black Bulga SCA	21
Blue Mountains NP	42
Blue Mountains NP	8.3
Blue Mountains NP	23
Blue Mountains NP	10
Blue Mountains NP	12
Bogendyra NR
Bolivia NR	1
BOLLONOLLA NR	2
Bondi Gulf NR	8
Bondi Gulf NR	6
Bondi Gulf NR	10
BONGIL BONGIL NP	0.3
BONGIL BONGIL NP	0.5
Boonoo Boonoo NP	9
Boonoo Boonoo NP	10
Booti Booti NP	0.5
Booti Booti NP	0.3
Booti Booti NP	3
Booti Booti NP	0.3
Booti Booti NP	3
Border Range NP	6
Border Ranges NP	4
Border Ranges NP	3
Border Ranges NP	4
Border Ranges NP	2.8
Bouddi NP	0.5
Bouddi NP	0.3
Bouddi NP	0.9
Bouddi NP	0.9
Bouddi NP	0.5
Bouddi NP	1.1
Bouddi NP	0.5
Bouddi NP	1.9
Bouddi NP	1.1
Bouddi NP	0.6
Bouddi NP	2.3
Bournda NR	10
Bournda NR	5
Bournda NR	0.5
Bournda NR	0.5
Bournda NR	0.5
Brindabella NP	20
Brisbane Water NP	4.4
Brisbane Water NP	2.4
Brisbane Water NP	3.7
Brisbane Water NP	3.6
Brisbane Water NP	0.3
Brisbane Water NP	3.1
Brisbane Water NP	0.6
Budawang NP	4.8
Budderoo NP	10
Bugong NP	3.1
Bundgalung NP	2
BUNDJALUNG NP	7
BUNDJALUNG NP	4.5
BUNDJALUNG NP	8
BUNDJALUNG NP	1.5
BUNDJALUNG NP	0.5
BUNDJALUNG NP	6
BUNDJALUNG NP	3
BUNDJALUNG NP	3
BUNDJALUNG NP	4
BUNDJALUNG NP	2
BUNDJALUNG NP	1
Bundundah Reserve	1.94
Bundundah Reserve/Morton NP	4.7
Bungawalbyn NP	2
Bungawalbyn NP	2.25
Bungawalbyn NP	4
Bungawalbyn NP	5
Bungawalbyn NP	3
Bungawalbyn NP	4.5
Bungawalbyn NP	6.5
Bungawalbyn NP	5
Bungawalbyn NP	1.65
Bungawalbyn NP	1.5
Burnt Down Scrub NR	2
Burnt School NR	2
Burrinjuck NR	8
Burrinjuck NR	15
Burrinjuck NR	3
Butterleaf NP
Butterleaf NP	3
Butterleaf NP	3.2
Butterleaf NP	1.2
Butterleaf NP	1.6
Butterleaf NP	1.2
Butterleaf NP	2
Butterleaf NP	1.8
Butterleaf NP	1.4
Butterleaf NP	0.5
Butterleaf NP	2.3
Butterleaf NP	3.3
Butterleaf NP	3.9
Butterleaf NP	5.3
Butterleaf NP	0.4
Butterleaf NP	0.5
Butterleaf NP	1.5
Butterleaf NP	2.9
Butterleaf NP	5.3
Butterleaf NP	4
Butterleaf NP	3.3
Butterleaf NP	3.6
Butterleaf NP	1.5
Butterleaf NP	8.8
Butterleaf NP	0.5
Capoompeta NP	10
Cataract NP
Cataract NP	1.5
Cataract NP	2
Cataract NP	2
Cataract NP	1.5
Cataract NP	2
Cataract NP	1
Clayton Chase	5
Clayton Chase	10
Clayton Chase	3.5
Clayton Chase	4
Clayton Chase	3
Clayton Chase	3
Clayton Chase	4
Conjola NP	5.7
Conjola NP	1.8
Conjola NP	8.3
Conjola NP	4.8
Conjola NP	2.9
Conjola NP	4.5
Conjola NP	6.5
Coolah Tops NR	28
Coolah Tops NR	1
Coolah Tops NR	6
Copeland Tops SCA	3
Copeland Tops SCA	3.5
Corramy SCA	0.7
Cottan-bimbang NP	6
Cottan-bimbang NP	16
Cottan-bimbang NP	15
Culgoa NP	30
Curramore NP
Curramore NP	8
Curramore NP	8.9
Curramore NP	11
Curramore NP	5.5
Dapper NR	10
Deua NP	15.2
Deua NP	1.4
Deua NP	1
Deua NP	4
Deua NP	21.5
Deua NP	2.1
Deua NP	1.4
Deua NP	3.3
Deua NP	8.5
Deua NP	20.8
Deua NP	5.3
Deua NP	6.6
Deua NP	28.2
Deua NP	5.65
DUNGGIR NP	4
Eurobodalla NP	0.8
Eurobodalla NP	2.5
Eurobodalla NP	0.8
Eurobodalla NP	2.4
Eurobodalla NP	2
Flaggy creek  NR	3
Flaggy creek  NR	1.8
GANAY NR	2
GANAY NR	2
Garawarra SCA
Garby NR	2
Gardens of Stone NP	18
Gibraltar NP	14
Goobang NP	5
Goobang NP	25
GUMBAYNGIR SCA	12
GUMBAYNGIR SCA	7
GUMBAYNGIR SCA	6
Ironbark NR	13.5
Jerrawangala NP	6.83
Jervis Bay NP	2.37
Jervis Bay NP	5.42
Jervis Bay NP	0.56
Jervis Bay NP	0.82
Jervis Bay NP	1.45
Jervis Bay NP	1.72
Jervis Bay NP	0.21
Jervis Bay NP	0.32
Jervis Bay NP	0.7
Jervis Bay NP	0.4
Jervis Bay NP	0.35
Jervis Bay NP	0.35
Jervis Bay NP	0.48
Jervis Bay NP	1.03
Jervis Bay NP	0.65
Jervis Bay NP	1.91
Jervis Bay NP	0.34
Jervis Bay NP	0.95
Jervis Bay NP	1.46
Jervis Bay NP	0.71
Jervis Bay NP	1.07
Jingellic NR	20
Karuah NR	10
Karuah NR	28
Karuah NR	10
Karuah NR	12
Karuah NR	1
Kings Plains NP	7
Kings Plains NP	0
Kings Plains NP	4
Koreelah NP	6
Kosciuszko NP	30
Kosciuszko NP	9.5
Kosciuszko NP	22
Kosciuszko NP	22
Kosciuszko NP	33
Kosciuszko NP	33
Kosciuszko NP	33
Kosciuszko NP	12
Kosciuszko NP	12
Kosciuszko NP	17
Kosciuszko NP	5
Kosciuszko NP	28
Kosciuszko NP	9
Kosciuszko NP	6
Kosciuszko NP	6
Kosciuszko NP	26
Kosciuszko NP	8.9
Kosciuszko NP	15
Kosciuszko NP	15
Kosciuszko NP	2.5
Kosciuszko NP	8.9
Kosciuszko NP	10
Kosciuszko NP	11
Kosciuszko NP	4.8
Kosciuszko NP	18
Kosciuszko NP	19
Kosciuszko NP	7.2
Kosciuszko NP	7.2
Kosciuszko NP	13
Kosciuszko NP	18
Kosciuszko NP	33
Kosciuszko NP	33
Kosciuszko NP	18
Kosciuszko NP	18
Kosciuszko NP	15
Kosciuszko NP	12
Kwiambal NP	7
Kwiambal NP	3
Kwiambal NP	2
Kwiambal NP	2.25
Lake Macquarie SCA	0.3
Lake Macquarie SCA	0.4
Lake Macquarie SCA	0.4
Lake Macquarie SCA	0.4
Ledknapper NR	15
Linton NR	12.5
Meroo NP	2.4
Meroo NP	0.9
Meroo NP	0.6
Meroo NP	3.3
Meroo NP	3.9
Meroo NP	3.5
Meroo NP	0.5
Morton NP	5.9
Morton NP	8.3
Morton NP	3.8
Morton NP	6
Morton NP	13
Morton NP	0.4
Morton NP	4.5
Morton NP	5
Morton NP	2.7
Morton NP	0.7
Morton NP	2.1
Morton NP	1
Morton NP	6
Mt Canobolas SCA	1
Mt Clunnie NP	6.5
Mt Dowling NR	2
MT NEVILLE NR	11
MT NEVILLE NR	1
MT NEVILLE NR	1.5
MT NEVILLE NR	11
MT NEVILLE NR	1.5
MT NEVILLE NR	3.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	2
MT PIKAPENE NP	4
MT PIKAPENE NP	2.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	1.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	1.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	4
MT PIKAPENE NP	7
MT PIKAPENE NP	2
MT PIKAPENE NP	2.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	6
MT PIKAPENE NP	3
MT PIKAPENE NP	0.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	0.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	2.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	2
MT PIKAPENE NP	1
MT PIKAPENE NP	2.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	6
MT PIKAPENE NP	2
MT PIKAPENE NP	1
MT PIKAPENE NP	2.5
MT PIKAPENE NP	2
MT PIKAPENE NP	1.5
Mummell Gulf NP	3
Mummell Gulf NP	7
Mummell Gulf NP	5
Munmorah SRA	0.7
Munmorah SRA	0.8
Munmorah SRA	0.45
Munmorah SRA	1
Munmorah SRA	2
Munmorah SRA	0.9
Munmorah SRA	1.6
Muogamarra NR	1
Murramarang NP	0.9
Murramarang NP	8
Murramarang NP	1
Murramarang NP	5.1
Murramarang NP	8.2
Murramarang NP	3.1
Murramarang NP	6.8
Murramarang NP	16
Murramarang NP	4.3
Murramarang NP	4
Myall Lakes NP	5
Myall Lakes NP	5
Myall Lakes NP	1.5
Myall Lakes NP	2
Myall Lakes NP	1
Myall Lakes NP	5
NGAMBAA NR	2
NGAMBAA NR	5
Nombinnie NR	10
Nymboida NP	6
Nymboida NP	12
Nymboida NP	3
Nymboida NP	4
Nymboida NP	1
Nymboida NP	4
Nymboida NP	4
Nymboida NP	3.2
Nymboida NP	4.5
Nymboida NP	2
Nymboida NP	4
Nymboida NP	2.8
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	4.2
Nymboida NP	7
Nymboida NP	6
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	10.7
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	19.1
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	13.4
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	18
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	18
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	15
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	33
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	33
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	5
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	5
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	4
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	3
Oxley Wild Rivers NP	7
Parma Creek NR	0.21
Parma Creek NR	0.07
Parma Creek NR	0.3
Parma Creek NR	0.01
Parma Creek NR	0.29
Parma Creek NR	5
Paroo Darling NP	60
Policemans Cap	10
Razorback NR	17
Richmond Range NP	3.9
Richmond Range NP	6.5
Richmond Range NP	3.8
Richmond Range NP	4.5
Richmond Range NP	5.5
Richmond Range NP	9
Royal NP	1
Seven Mile Beach NP	1.09
Seven Mile Beach NP	1.79
Seven Mile Beach NP	2.24
Seven Mile Beach NP	0.74
Seven Mile Beach NP	2.03
Severn River NR	6
Single NP	21
South East Forest NP	5
South East Forest NP	1.2
South East Forest NP	1.2
South East Forest NP	2.6
South East Forest NP	3
South East Forest NP	10.9
South East Forest NP	1.3
South East Forest NP	1
South East Forest NP	1.2
South East Forest NP	2.8
South East Forest NP	2
South East Forest NP	1.2
South East Forest NP	2
South East Forest NP	5.1
South East Forest NP	3.5
South East Forest NP	0.5
South East Forest NP	6
South East Forest NP	3
South East Forest NP	1
South East Forest NP	5.5
South East Forest NP	0.8
Stoney Batter NR	6
Tapitallee NR	0.52
Tapitallee NR	0.33
Tapitallee NR	0.36
Tapitallee NR	0.32
Tarlo River NP	3.8
Tarlo River NP	2.1
Tarlo River NP	2.9
Tarlo River NP	5.9
Tarlo River NP	6.5
Tarlo River NP	2.7
Tarlo River NP	2.1
Tarlo River NP	6
Tollingo NR	150
Tomaree NP	1.8
Tooloom NP	3
Toonumbar NP	31.9
Toonumbar NP	8.5
Toonumbar NP	17
Toonumbar NP	21.5
Triplarina NR	0.71
Triplarina NR	0.32
Triplarina NR	0.66
Triplarina NR	0.75
Triplarina NR	1.34
Triplarina NR	0.31
Triplarina NR	1.24
Triplarina NR	1.35
Ungazetted (Kalyarr NP)	48
Ungazetted (Kalyarr NP)	26
Unknown	7
Wa Hou NR	10
Wa Hou NR	1
Wa Hou NR	7
Wa Hou NR	1
Wa Hou NR	11
Wa Hou NR	1
Wa Hou NR	7
Wa Hou NR	1
Wa Hou NR	1
Wa Hou NR	1
Wa Hou NR	1
Wallaroo NR	3
Wallaroo NR	1.5
Wallaroo NR	8
Wallaroo NR	5
Wallaroo NR	11
Wallaroo NR	7
Wallaroo NR	7
Wallaroo NR	16
Wallaroo NR	6
Wallingat NP	2
Wallingat NP	1.3
Wallingat NP	3.6
Wallingat NP	3.3
Washpool Np	18
Washpool NP	5.3
Washpool NP	5.6
Washpool NP	7.1
Washpool NP	6.4
Washpool NP	1.6
Washpool NP	7
Washpool NP	2.8
Watson’s Creek NR	5
Wereboldera SCA	9
Woggoon NR	144
Wollemi NP	21
Wollemi NP	12
Wollemi NP	10
Wollemi NP	30
Wollemi NP	7
Wollemi NP	11
Wollemi NP	7
Wollemi NP	16
Wollemi NP	2
Wollemi NP	8
Wollemi NP	5
Woodford Island NR	1.5
Woodford Island NR	2
Woodford Island NR	3
Woodford Island NR	3
Woollamia NR	1.51
Woollamia NR	0.77
Woollamia NR	1.95
Woollamia NR	1.88
Woollamia NR	0.74
Woomargama NP	15
Yabbra NP	8
Yabbra NP	45
Yango NP	0.45
Yanununbeyan NP	11
YARRIABINNI NP	2
YARRIABINNI NP	3
YARRIABINNI NP	5
YARRIABINNI NP	6
YARRIABINNI NP	4
Yuraygir NP	4
Yuraygir NP	3.5
Yuraygir NP	1
Yuraygir NP	1
YURAYGIR NP	0.03
Yuraygir NP	1
Yuraygir NP	3.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	1.5
Yuraygir NP	28
Yuraygir NP	10
Yuraygir NP	12
Yuraygir NP	1
Yuraygir NP	1
Yuraygir NP	4
Yuraygir NP	3.5
	3,785.10 Ha

i.e.  An area 6km x 6km

.

NSW Local Government Areas (LGAs)

Bush Fire Management Committee / LGA	Reserve / Activity Name	Treatment Area (km2)
Blue Mountains	Northern Strategic Line -Primary	8
Blue Mountains	De Faurs Trail – Mt Wilson -Primary	2.8
Blue Mountains	Mitchell’s Creek Fire Trail – Primary	3.5
Blue Mountains	Nellies Glen Fire Trail	2.8
Blue Mountains	Back Creek Fire Trail – Primary	3.2
Blue Mountains	Mt Piddington Trail – Hornes Point	N/A
Bombala	Gibraltar Ridge Fire Trail (2) (PT)	20
Bombala	Mt Rixs Fire Trail (PT)	6
Bombala	Roaring Camp Fire Trail (PT)	12
Cooma-Monaro	Brest Fire Trail (2) (PT)	15
Cooma-Monaro	Calabash Fire Trail (2) (PT)	22
Cooma-Monaro	Murrumbucca Fire Trail (2) (ST)	15
Cooma-Monaro	Bridge Fire Trail (2) (PT)	6
Cooma-Monaro	Log In Hole Fire Trail (2) (PT)	5
Gloucester	Upper Avon Fire Trail	11
Greater Argyle	Mountain Ash Fire Trail	10
Greater Argyle	Mootwingee Fire Trail	6
Greater Hume	Murphy’s Fire Trail	0.2
Greater Hume	Mandaring Fire Trail	1
Greater Queanbeyan City	Queanbeyan River Fire Trail	5.5
Greater Queanbeyan City	Gourock Fire Trail	5.8
Hawkesbury District	Jacks Trail	1.6
Hawkesbury District	Duffys Trail (2) ?tenure	3
Mallee	Various Fire Trails	N/A
Mallee	No 21 Fire Trail	20
Namoi/Gwydir	Warialda State Forest	6.5
Namoi/Gwydir	Zaba-Kaiwarra-Kiora Fire Trail (check)	10
Namoi/Gwydr	Blue Nobby Fire Trail (check)	8
Namoi/Gwydr	Araluen Fire Trail (check)	6
Snowy River	Snowy Plain Fire Trail (2) (PT)	18
Snowy River	Crackenback Fire Trail (PT)	10
Snowy River	Devils Hole Fire Trail (PT)	18
Snowy River	Golden Age Fire Trail (2) (PT)	8
Sutherland	Sabugal Pass Fire Trail	N/A
SW Mallee	Various Fire Trails	N/A
SW Mallee	Oberwells Fire Trail	28
SW Mallee	Mandleman Fire Trail	40
Upper Lachlan	Johnsons Creek Fire Trail	15
Warringah/Pittwater	Lovett Bay Trail (2)	2.5
Warringah/Pittwater	Elvina Bay Trail (2)	1.5
Yass Valley	Nelanglo Fire Trail	21
Yass Valley	Hayshed Fire Trail 1	7
Yass Valley	Hayshed Fire Trail 2	7
		391.90 km2

i.e.   An area 20km x 20km

.

Forests NSW (government’s industrial logger of NSW remnant forests).

(Forests NSW did not publish the area burnt, only the cost. As a rule of thumb use $3000/square km)

Bush Fire Management Committee	Reserve / Activity Name	NSW Allocation
Clarence Zone	Dalmorton SF	$30,000
Future Forests	Swan	$20,050
Future Forests	Tindall	$10,680
Future Forests	Tooloom	$10,425
Future Forests	Mazzer	$7,341
Future Forests	Kungurrabah	$4,435
Future Forests	Morpeth Park	$3,773
Future Forests	Loughnan	$3,155
Future Forests	Inglebar	$3,000
Future Forests	Lattimore	$2,604
Future Forests	Byrne	$1,755
Future Forests	Ziull 4	$1,677
Future Forests	Lejag	$1,670
Future Forests	Ziull 2	$1,600
Future Forests	Bates	$1,563
Future Forests	Ziull 3	$1,454
Future Forests	Envirocom	$1,410
Future Forests	Morgan	$1,361
Future Forests	McNamara	$1,279
Future Forests	Neaves	$967
Future Forests	Zuill	$872
Future Forests	Boyle	$807
Future Forests	Fitzpatrick	$791
Future Forests	Morrow	$785
Future Forests	Morrow	$785
Future Forests	Morrow	$785
Future Forests	Wallwork	$665
Future Forests	Smith	$665
Future Forests	Wilson	$622
Future Forests	Jarramarumba	$600
Future Forests	Hession	$597
Future Forests	Edwards	$563
Future Forests	Maunder	$558
Future Forests	Kuantan	$515
Future Forests	Billins	$484
Future Forests	Cox	$475
Future Forests	Paterson	$461
Future Forests	Gladys	$415
Future Forests	O’Keefe	$371
Future Forests	Woodcock	$369
Future Forests	Pratten	$346
Future Forests	Truswell	$323
Future Forests	Divine	$323
Future Forests	Hastings	$323
Future Forests	White	$300
Future Forests	Miller	$300
Future Forests	Koop	$300
Future Forests	Lacy	$277
Future Forests	Nosrac	$277
Future Forests	Tully	$277
Future Forests	Baker	$277
Future Forests	Yaganegi	$277
Future Forests	Siezowski	$254
Future Forests	Zuill	$254
Future Forests	Atcheson	$254
Future Forests	Dissevelt	$254
Future Forests	Hoy	$254
Future Forests	Woods	$254
Future Forests	Dawson	$254
Future Forests	Hagan	$254
Future Forests	Skelly	$231
Future Forests	Robards	$231
Future Forests	Maunder	$231
Future Forests	Day	$231
Future Forests	O’Connell	$231
Future Forests	Kompara	$231
Future Forests	Carmen	$231
Future Forests	Maurer	$231
Future Forests	Cunin	$208
Future Forests	GCC	$208
Future Forests	White	$208
Future Forests	Hayer	$208
Future Forests	Southgate	$208
Future Forests	Peck	$208
Greater Taree	Kiwarrak SF	$40,000
Hastings	Cowarra SF	$30,000
Hastings	Caincross SF	$4,000
Hume	Clearing fire trails	$100,000
Hume	New FT	$6,000
Hunter	Pokolbin SF	$13,600
Hunter	Myall River SF	$12,800
Hunter	Myall River SF	$12,800
Hunter	Heaton SF	$12,400
Hunter	Bulahdelah SF	$6,100
Hunter	Watagan SF	$3,200
Hunter	Awaba SF	$3,200
Hunter	Myall River SF	$3,100
Macquarie	Warrengong	$16,250
Macquarie	Vulcan & Gurnang	$11,519
Macquarie	Kinross SF	$8,800
Macquarie	Mount David	$6,101
Macquarie	Newnes SF	$5,199
Macquarie	Printing 25 fire atlas’	$2,048
Macquarie	Black Rock Ridge	$447
Mid-Nth Coast – Taree	Knorrit SF	$36,000
Mid-Nth Coast – Taree	Yarratt SF	$16,000
Mid-Nth Coast – Wauchope	Boonanghi SF	$37,000
Mid-Nth Coast – Wauchope	Northern Break	$9,000
Mid-Nth Coast – Wauchope	Caincross SF	$3,000
Mid-Nth Coast – Wauchope	Western Break	$2,000
Monaro	Clearing fire trails	$114,685
North East	Thumb Creek SF	$46,000
North East	Candole SF	$29,535
North East	Various State Forests	$20,000
North East	Mt Belmore SF	$12,115
North East	Candole SF	$8,900
North East	Lower Bucca SF	$5,500
North East	All North Region	$3,300
North East	Wild Cattle SF	$3,000
North East	Orara East SF	$1,900
Northern -Casino	Barragunda	$11,522
Northern -Casino	Yaraldi 2003	$8,847
Northern -Casino	Yaraldi 2004	$3,207
Richmond Valley	Bates	$20,000
Richmond Valley	Whiporie SF	$13,154
Richmond Valley	Swanson	$12,000
Richmond Valley	McNamara	$10,180
Richmond Valley	Whiporie SF	$9,582
Southern	Pollwombra FT	$6,360
Southern-Eden	Various – whole district	$112,019
Tamworth	Nundle SF	$40,000
Walcha	Nowendoc SF	$30,000
Walcha	Styx River SF	$20,000
		$1,073,482

i.e.  Approximately an area 20km x 20km

 .

NSW Department of Lands    (what native vegetation’s left).

Bush Fire Management Committee	Reserve / Activity Name	Treatment Area Ha / Other	Treatment Area (km2)
Baulkham Hills	Porters Rd / Cranstons Rd		5
Baulkham Hills	Porters Rd / Cranstons Rd (2)		4
Baulkham Hills	Pauls Road Trail		5
Baulkham Hills	Mount View Trail		1
Baulkham Hills	Idlewild		2
Baulkham Hills	Maroota Tracks Trail		7
Baulkham Hills	Yoothamurra Trail		1
Baulkham Hills	Kellys Arm Trail		3
Baulkham Hills	Dargle Ridge Trail		5
Baulkham Hills	Dargle Trail		3
Baulkham Hills	Days Road Trail		3
Baulkham Hills	Dickinsons Trail		6
Baulkham Hills	Fingerboard Trail		3
Baulkham Hills	Floyds Road Trail		8
Baulkham Hills	Neichs Road Trail		4
Bega	Eden Strategic Fire Trail		3
Bega	Illawambera Fire Trail		1
Bega	Merimbula/Turu Beach Strategic Protection		2
Bega	Yankees Gap		2
Bega	Millingandi Special Protection (Trail)		1
Bega	Wallagoot Strategic Protection (Trail)		1.2
Bega	South Eden Strategic Protection (Trail)		1
Bega	Merimbula/Pambula Strategic Protection (APZ)		1
Bega	Pacific St Tathra		0.5
Bland	Bland Villages (FTM)		2
Bland	Water Tower Reserve FTM		3
Blue Mountains	Cripple Creek Fire Trail Stage 2		5
Blue Mountains	Cripple Creek Fire Trail Complex		5
Blue Mountains	Caves Creek Trail		0.4
Blue Mountains	Edith Falls Trail		2
Blue Mountains	Boronia Rd – Albert Rd Trails		1
Blue Mountains	Perimeter Trail – North Hazelbrook		1.5
Blue Mountains	McMahons Point Trail – Kings Tableland		7
Blue Mountains	Back Creek Fire Trail		3.2
Blue Mountains	Mitchell’s Creek Fire Trail		3.5
Bombala	Gibraltar Ridge Fire Trail		11
Bombala	Burnt Hut Fire Trail		5
Bombala	Merriangah East Fire Trail		12
Bombala	Bombala Towns & Villages (Trails)		10
Campbelltown	St Helens Park – Wedderburn Rd (Barriers)		0.3
Campbelltown	Barrier / Gate
Campbelltown	Riverview Rd Fire Trail		0.65
Canobolas	Calula Range FTM
Canobolas	Spring Glen Estate FTM
Cessnock	Neath South West Fire Trail		2
Cessnock	Neath South East Fire Trail		1.5
Cessnock	Neath North Fire Trail (2)		1
Cessnock	Gates – Asset Protection Zones
Cessnock	Signs – Asset Protection Zones
Cessnock	Signs – Fire Trails
Cessnock	Kearsley Fire Trail		0.5
Cessnock	Neath – South (Trail)		4
Cessnock	Neath – North (Trail)		2
Clarence Valley	Bowling Club Fire Trail		1
Clarence Valley	Brooms Head Fire Trail		0.2
Clarence Valley	Ilarwill Village		0.3
Cooma-Monaro	Chakola Fire Trail		21
Cooma-Monaro	Good Good Fire Trail		12
Cooma-Monaro	Inaloy Fire Trail		19
Cooma-Monaro	Cowra Creek Fire Trail		4
Cooma-Monaro	David’s Fire Trail		2.1
Cooma-Monaro	Clear Hills Fire Trail		5
Cooma-Monaro	Mt Dowling Fire Trail		16
Cooma-Monaro	Towneys Ridge Fire Trail		6
Cunningham	Warialda Periphery 2		20
Cunningham	Upper Bingara Fire Trail
Dungog	Dungog Fire Trail Signs
Far North Coast	Byrangary Fire Trail		1
Far North Coast	Main Arm Fire Trail (NC67)		2
Far North Coast	Burringbar Fire Trail (NC69)		1
Far North Coast	Mill Rd Fire Trail (NC95)		1
Far North Coast	Broken Head Fire Trail (NC68)		0.5
Far North Coast	New Brighton Fire Trail (NC44)		0.5
Far North Coast	Mooball Spur Fire Trail		1
Far North Coast	Palmwoods Fire Trail (NC06)		0.5
Gloucester	Coneac Trail		6
Gloucester	Moores Trail		6
Gloucester	Mt Mooney Fire Trail		6
Gosford District	Signs – Fire Trails
Great Lakes	Ebsworth Fire Trail		1
Great Lakes	Tuncurry High Fire Trail		0.6
Great Lakes	Monterra Ave Trail – Hawks Nest		0.7
Greater Argyle	Browns Rd Komungla		12
Greater Argyle	Greater Argyle Fire Trail Maintenance
Greater Argyle	Cookbundoon Fire Trail		2
Greater Taree District	Tinonee St Road Reserve		0.25
Greater Taree District	Beach St SFAZ – Wallabi Point		0.35
Greater Taree District	Sth Woodlands Dr – SFAZ		1.3
Greater Taree District	Cedar Party Rd – Taree		2
Hawkesbury District	Sargents Road (2)  ?tenure		0.75
Hawkesbury District	Parallel Trail (2)		2.5
Hawkesbury District	Parallel Trail (1)		1.1
Hornsby/Ku-ring-gai	Tunks Ridge, Dural		1
Hornsby/Ku-ring-gai	Radnor & Cairnes Fire Trail		0.5
Hornsby/Ku-ring-gai	Binya Cl, Hornsby Heights		1.5
Shellharbour District	Saddleback – Hoddles Trail		3
Shellharbour District	Rough Range Trail		1
Lake Macquarie District	Kilaben Bay Fire Trail		1.5
Lake Macquarie District	Gates – Access Management
Lake Macquarie District	Signs – APZ
Lake Macquarie District	Signs – Fire Trails
Lithgow	Wilsons Glen Trail		6.1
Lithgow	Kanimbla Fire Trail No 314		7.8
Lithgow	Camels Back Trail No 312		4.5
Lithgow	Crown Creek Trail No 206		7
Lithgow	Capertee Common Trail No 203		3
Lower Hunter Zone	Access Infrastructure – All Districts
Lower North Coast	Cabbage Tree Lane Fire Trail, Kempsey		1.5
Lower North Coast	Bullocks Quarry Fire Trail		0.66
Lower North Coast	Perimeter Protection, Main St, Eungai Creek, Nambucca		0.6
Mid North Coast	Urunga Lagoon, Bellingen		4
Mid North Coast	Wenonah Head, Bellingen		4
Mudgee	Munro’s Fire Trail		24
Mudgee	Munro’s Fire Trail		5.25
Penrith	Londonderry/Castlereagh		6
Port Stephens	Bobs Farm Fire Trails		4
Port Stephens	Salamander Way Fire Trail		1.5
Port Stephens	Gan Gan Hill West Fire Trail		1.2
Port Stephens	Nelson Bay – Gan Gan Hill (Trail)		1.5
Port Stephens	Taylors Beach Fire Trail		1
Port Stephens	Nelson Bay – Wallawa Rd (SFAZ)		0.7
Port Stephens	Taylors Beach East Fire Trail		3.5
Port Stephens	Nelson Bay – Wallawa Rd (Gates)
Port Stephens	Port Stephens Fire Trail Signs
Port Stephens	Corlette – Salamander Way (Trail)		1
Shoalhaven	APZ Access Works
Snowy River	Southern Boundary Fire Trail		3
Snowy River	Somme Valley Fire Trail		5
Sutherland District	Forbes Creek North Trail		1.3
Sutherland District	Still Creek Complex (Trail)		3.8
Sutherland District	Mannikin Trail		1.5
Sutherland District	Viburnum Trail		0.8
Sutherland District	Mill Creek Complex		2.6
Sutherland District	Loftus Creek Complex		1.9
Sutherland District	Cranberry Trail		0.8
Sutherland District	Turella Trail		0.8
Sutherland District	Freemantle Trail		0.4
Sutherland District	Illaroo Trail		0.7
Sutherland District	Yala East Trail		0.9
Sutherland District	Bunyan Fire Trail		1.2
Sutherland District	Rosewell Service Trail		0.5
Sutherland District	Belarada Service Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Belbowrie Service Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Leawarra Fire Trail		0.9
Sutherland District	McKenzie Service Trail		0.7
Sutherland District	Walsh Close Trail		0.7
Sutherland District	Yala West Trail		0.7
Sutherland District	Barnes Cres Service Trail		0.6
Sutherland District	Illumba Trail		0.5
Sutherland District	Penrose Trail		0.5
Sutherland District	Tatler Place Trail		0.5
Sutherland District	Torumba Service Trail		0.5
Sutherland District	Friendship Trail		0.4
Sutherland District	Kippax – Rosewall Trail		0.4
Sutherland District	Tallarook Service Trail		0.4
Sutherland District	Billa Service Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Chestnut Trail		0.2
Sutherland District	Croston Rd Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Kingswood Rd Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Roebourne Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Whimbrel Service Trail		0.3
Sutherland District	Shearwater Trail		0.1
Tamworth	Moore Creek Dam Reserve		3.5
Tamworth	Moore Creek Dam Reserve		1
Tumut	Bundarbo Fire Trail (Stage 1)		30
Tumut	Yammatree Reserve		2
Tumut	Thomas Boyd Track Head		2
Tumut	Tumut Bush Common		5
Tumut	Batlow Hill		2
Tumut	Rimmers Ridge – Adelong
Tumut	Bangadang		7
Upper Lachlan	Upper Lachlan Fire Trail Maintenance
Upper Lachlan	Isabella Fire Trail		10
Wagga Wagga	Silvatite Reserve (Trails)		5
Wagga Wagga	Wagga Wagga Towns & Villages (Trails)		10
Wagga Wagga	Kyeamba Gap		4
Wagga Wagga	San Isadore		3
Warringah/Pittwater	Sandy Trail		0.1
Warringah/Pittwater	Lovett Bay Trail		2.5
Warringah/Pittwater	Elvina Bay Trail		1.5
Warringah/Pittwater	Aumuna Cooyong Trail		0.2
Wingecarribee	P3 Fire Trail		6
Wingecarribee	Weir Fire trail		3.8
Wingecarribee	Lukes Fire trail		0.1
Wollondilly	Bargo Weir Fire Trail		10
Wyong District	YMCA North / South Link Fire Trail		2
Wyong District	YMCA South / Kanangra Dr Fire Trail		2
Wyong District	Lake Munmorah Fire Trails		3.25
Wyong District	Hyles St Fire Trail, Chittaway Pt		0.1
Wyong District	Big “T” and YMCA Link Fire Trails		1.5
Wyong District	Lake Road Fire Trail, Chittaway Point		0.1
Wyong District	Big “T” Fire Trail – Crangan Bay		1.1
Wyong District	Wyong APZ Signs
Wyong District	Lake Road Fire Trail, Tuggerah		1
Wyong District	Doyalson North, 219-225 Pacific Hway (Trail)		0.8
Yass Valley	Yass Valley Fire Trail Maintenance
			565.16

i.e.  Approximately an area 24km x 24km

. .

This article was initially written by Tigerquoll and published on CanDoBetter.net under the title ‘Selfish Murray River Rice Growers downstream continue to castrate the Snowy River‘ on 20100131

.
The Mighty Snowy
Australia’s High Country
[Source: Adventure Pro, ^http://www.adventurepro.com.au/forums/yabbfiles/Attachments/phpePMK2XAM.jpg]

.

‘What does the Snowy River mean to Australians?

To many ancestral Australians, particularly Eastern Victorians, ‘The Snowy’ is a legendary, wild river. 

To the traditional Ngarigo, Walgalu and Southern Ngunnawal people – who asked their opinion, requested their approval?

Would traditional owner’s approval been given?  Likely, if open and honest, no bloody way!

The Snowy represents the untamed heart and soul of Australia’s cold frontier High Country

It is a mighty, wild river demanding respect.

But in 1950s Australia, when the colonist Government built its Hydro Scheme, it set out with disrespect to castrate this thundering stallion of a river down to a humiliating prostate trickle.’

~ Ed.

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Our (stolen) Snowy River, reduced to a trickle

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“Gone are the days
When the Snowy was a river not just a creek.
When the snow water flushed out the entire river.
When the river was deep enough to take large sized boats and ships.
When as a youngster I had picnics on the Curlip paddle-steamer up and down the Snowy River.
When the river bank had several landings to load and unload goods and produce.
When the entrance was deep enough to be safe for all who wished to use it.
The Snowy is just like a ship that has run aground.
Both are no longer able to do what was required of them.
Having lived in Orbost – Marlo all my life
It’s a sad sight to see our Snowy water vanish over the hills to the other side.”

~ bush poem by W. B. Dreverman, born Orbost 12-1-1910.

.PS. I have worked in Orbost all my life; moved from Orbost to Marlo during 1965; now retired; my wife and I enjoy looking at the ocean and the Snowy when the tide comes in. During our lives we have seen the Snowy change from a beautiful river to a sandy bottom creek.

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Kosciusko Main Range above the source of the Snowy River

[Source: ^http://forum.weatherzone.com.au/ubbthreads.php/topics/1095133/154]

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Account by Charlie Robertson, born in 1919 at Dalgety:

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“I lived one kilometre from the Snowy River for most of my life.

We could always hear the Snowy singing from home. That is how I used to describe the sound of the river. It used to be quieter in the summer. Now we don’t hear it at all. You wouldn’t know there was a river there now. It was a clear river most of the time, 99 per cent pure. It’s hard water now. Before it was soft.

The river had a gravelly sandy bed with rocks and boulders but they’re overgrown now and you can’t see them. During the spring thaw it used to flow for three months at least in a good strong flow, bank to bank. The level used to be up into the first ring on the pylon for that period.”

…It was a very popular river for fishing. You could see the fish from the bridge. You could just about get to the river anywhere you wanted with some exceptions. Now you can hardly get to it for the weeds, willows and blackberries.

When the river was dammed there was nothing to fish. There was no fish in the dams just after they were built. I have been up there and it doesn’t interest me at all, especially when you’ve spent much of your life fishing the river. It’s a different kind of fishing all together. I used to fish at night for native fish.

They are all gone now. I gave up fishing when they dammed the river. “

The Snowy Mountains Hydro-Electric Scheme is the most complex, multi-purpose, multi-reservoir hydro scheme in the world with 80 kilometres of aqueducts, 140 kilometres of tunnels, 16 large dams and seven power stations, two of which are underground. The project was drievn by then Labor Prime Minister Ben Chifley.  It commenced under an Act of Federal Parliament in October 1949 with the goal of diverting the Murrumbidgee, Snowy and Tumut Rivers in south western NSW essentially to provide irrigation water for the western side of the Great Dividing Range, and in the process generate hydro-electric power.  This irrigation facilitated settlement of mass immigration.

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Account by Pip Cogan, born in 1913 at Dalgety and resident 85 years, a grazier:

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“The Snowy River was part of my life until it was dammed.

I had fished the river since I was a young fellow action against the NSW Government for failing to honour a five-year review of the Snowy Hydro Corporation’s water licence. The Alliance is arguing the legal provisions allowing the Mowamba water flow to be increased without compensationary payments.

It is clear from reading the Snowy Scientific Committee’s three reports so far that the Snowy upper reaches are sick, despite the $425 million agreement in 2002 by three governments to restore it. Sacrificed long ago to humanity’s needs for hydroelectricity and irrigation water for the Murray Darling food bowl, in drought the river has become so deprived of lusty water flow that its cobbles do not turn over. Its deep pools alienate life forms, forbiddingly hot on top and cold on the bottom.

Last month the scientific committee warned the NSW Government that the limited environmental flows allowed from Snowy Hydro dams provide mere ”life support” for plants and animals in the river.”

The continued demise of the magnificent Snowy River is attributed to the political influence of the long downstream self-interested rice growers, cotton growers and citrus and grape  growers, all wholly artifically dependent on irrigation from the Murray River, fed by the Snowy River upstream. 

But such exploitive irrigation-dependent industries have powerful political friends like the Australian Government Rural Industries Research and Dever the way that it was and it to look at it today is simply heartbreaking.”

 

The Snowy River was dry as a bone at Island Bend Dam in February 2010.

(Snowy River Alliance: Louise Crisp)

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Account by Kevin Schaefer, born 1925 at Dalgety, resident for 73 years:

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“The Snowy River was a real river.

In the spring the river flowed very strong after the snow melt. This strong flow existed for many months, usually from August to November. Whilst the spring was characterised by strong flows, the Snowy River could have heavy flows or flooding any time of the year.  For example the biggest flood in my lifetime occurred in the summer of 1934.

All the mountain water came down here. The Snowy River’s water was clean and pure.

In fact when you drank it, you couldn’t get enough of it. I can remember the years between 1949 and 1956 as being particularly wet, with a peak in river flow in March 1950 when it flooded. The river could rise and fall all year round depending on the rainfall.

In my lifetime I never saw the river any where near as low as it has been since the damming. …I haven’t seen the platypus like I used to. You could see colonies of platypus along the river before.

Now you’re lucky to see one.”

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Talbingo Dam artificially flooded the Snowy River

(‘Tumut 3’ Power Station below)

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The Snowy River Alliance down here in Victoria is right. Australia’s most famous wild river, the Snowy River, deserves to have its natural flows restored.

The Alliance argues that if the Hydro schemers release just a third of the Snowy’s original flows, its ecology could be restored. But the current life sucking 5% dished out by the Snowy Hydro Ltd corporation is exploitative, selfish and wrong.

The Snowy River Alliance, according to Glenice White of Orbost, deep in Victoria’s East Gippsland, started off back in 1971 as a reaction to the Snowy’s “pronounced signs of degradation“. This local community reaction culminated in the Snowy River Interstate Catchment Co-ordinating Committee Report, which outlined the problems of the river and its catchment and made a number of recommendations including that more water was required to improve the river’s ecology.

It soon became apparent to the Snowy River community that the Snowy Hydro was steering the river’s water to the irrigation agriculturalists down the Murray River, trying to artificially grow rice, citrus and grapes in an otherwise parched hot semi-arid climate.

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Whereas the much hyped electricity generation in reality became a small part of the operation.

Instead of supplying 17% of the South Eastern Grid as the Snowy Mountains Hydro Electric Authority would want the public to believe,

it supplies only 4-5%.

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The propaganda from the Authority is not only misleading but downright wrong.

Since the Snowy Mountains Hydro Electric Scheme of the 1950s, the choice of water allocation has always been political. The construction of the Jindabyne Dam in 1967 destroyed the 150 year old local community of Dalgety, which had the Snowy running wild through the town.

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Dalgety’s fresh water supply was reduced to a token 1% flow!

The township of Dalgety has not recovered to this day. 

The original townships of Adaminaby, Jindabyne and Talbingo were inundated by the Hydro Scheme.

These communities deserve not to be forgotten

Nor the millions of hectares of dismissed wildlife habitat, flooded for irrigation of exotic crops.

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In 1996 a report commissioned and prepared by the NSW Department of Land and Water Conservation, Victorian Department of Natural Resources and Environment (now the  Department of Sustainability and Environment) and the Snowy Mountains Hydro Electric Authority recommended that a minimum of 28% of the original flow that passed Jindabyne before the dams were built, be reinstated to the river.

A key perception problem is that Hydro industrialists argue that any water not piped to hydro-electricity or to fill dams is wasted water flow that just runs into the sea. These water industrialists reject the concept of ecological river flows as barbarian.  Then recently, the Snowy River Alliance has flagged the opening of the Mowamba River which is a headwater tributary to the Snowy. Currently, it is captured by a weir where it is whipped away via an aqueduct to Lake Jindabyne.

Lake Jindbyne is a flooded Snowy River

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An article, ‘Standoff over the Snowy’ by Debra Jopson, 30-Jan-10, (Fairfax media) has highlighted that the Snowy River Alliance plans legal action against the NSW Government for failing to honour a five-year review of the Snowy Hydro Corporation‘s water licence. The Alliance is arguing the legal provisions allowing the Mowamba water flow to be increased without compensationary payments.

It is clear from reading the Snowy Scientific Committee’s three reports so far that the Snowy upper reaches are sick, despite the $425 million agreement in 2002 by three governments to restore it.

Sacrificed long ago to humanity’s needs for hydroelectricity and irrigation water for the Murray Darling food bowl, in drought the river has become so deprived of lusty water flow that its cobbles do not turn over. Its deep pools alienate life forms, forbiddingly hot on top and cold on the bottom.  Last month the scientific committee warned the NSW Government that the limited environmental flows allowed from Snowy Hydro dams provide mere ‘‘life support” for plants and animals in the river.

The continued demise of the magnificent Snowy River is attributed to the political influence of the long downstream self-interested rice growers, cotton growers and citrus and grape growers, all wholly artifically dependent on irrigation from the Murray River, fed by the Snowy River upstream.

A diverted river

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But such exploitive irrigation-dependent industries have powerful political friends like:

• The Australian Government Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation
• The Australian Government Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry (whatever its latest political reincarnation)
• Ricegrowers Association of Australia
• SunRice
• Rabobank
• Wesfarmers Federation Insurance
• CopRice
• Rice Marketing Board of NSW
• Go Grains Health & Nutrition Ltd
• Coleambally Irrigation
• Goulburn-Murray Water
• Murray Irrigation Limited
• Snowy Hydro
• NSW Irrigators’ Council
• Snowy Mountains Engineering Corporation
• The Kondinin (agricultural) Group
• Cotton Australia
• NSW Farmers’  Association
• National Farmers’ Federation
• The Australian Rural Leadership Program
• amongst others.

Upper reaches of The Snowy

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‘Dairy industry is a big environmental burden’ 

(comment by Milly on CanDoBetter.net, 20100131):

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Dairy exports make Australia one of the world’s largest exporter of virtual water, despite it being one of the driest continents on the planet!  Dairy production takes place in all states, but it is particularly significant in Victoria, where more than 60 per cent of all dairy farming enterprises are located. The number of dairy farms has declined steadily over recent decades, but the industry is trending towards larger and intensive farming.

Approximately 569 GL/year is transferred across from the Snowy River Basin and released to the Murray River upstream of Hume Reservoir. Fifty percent of this water is allocated to the Victorian River Murray diverters. The other fifty percent is allocated to New South Wales. Dairying is the heaviest user of irrigated water, often requiring irrigated pasture.

 

Hume Weir

..dammed and flooded the Murray and Mitta Rivers to create artificial Lake Hume for irrigation farming.

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Constructed over a 17-year period from 28 November 1919 to 1936 with a workforce of thousands, a branch siding from the Wodonga – Cudgewa railway was built to supply materials. It was extended during the 1950s, and completed in 1961, necessitating the wholesale removal of Tallangatta township and its re-establishment at a new site eight kilometres west of the original, as well as railway and road diversions.

In 2007 Japanese beverage giant Kirin acquired dairy processor National Foods for $2.8 billion. The emergence of large multi-national companies as significant players in the Australian dairy industry was forcing producers to bulk up to larger farms.  Dairy Australia’s managing director Mike Ginnivan said the industry would remain a major user of water in the Murray Darling Basin for at least the next 10 years and would necessitate continued improvements in water use efficiency.  By banning the export of dairy products and reducing our own consumption we may have a chance to save our ailing river systems!

Close to the source of the Snowy River

[Source: ^http://unauthorised.org/ronni/bioregion/rivers.html]

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‘The Snowy Hydro Con – it was all about mass irrigation and mass immigration’

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Since Australia’s Gold boom and the exponential immigration growth it attracted, European colonists had dreamed of controlling the seasonally flooding rivers of the ranges along eastern Australia into dams, in order to provide reliable irrigation to harvest inland plains for agriculture and resist Australia’s periodic long droughts – i.e. provide for ‘drought security‘.

The wild Snowy River was long regarded by many European colonists as a wasted resource, because it flowed to the sea through country that was already well watered. Proposals to divert the river for irrigation and power generation were presented from as early as the 1880s but it was not until the 1940s that the necessary resources and technological capacity were realised with the Snowy Mountains Scheme.

In 1949, the Chifley Labor Government was enraptured with its post-War ‘populate or perish‘ mantra.  It embarked on Australia’s greatest immigration scheme and channelled 100,000 migrant jobs into building the Snowy Mountains Hydro Scheme  and designated the Riverina Region to mass agricultural settlement and production.  The Government decided to dam the snow-fed headwaters of the east flowing Snowy River and divert them into the Murray River, which heads west through farmland along the NSW-Victoria border.

Labor Prime Minister Ben Chifley (1945-49)

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Construction started on 17 October 1949, when the Governor General Sir William McKell, Prime Minister Ben Chiffley and the Scheme’s first Commissioner, Sir William Hudson, fired the first blast at Adaminaby.  The Snowy River was finally dammed twice: first at its headwaters at Island Bend in 1965, and again downstream at Jindabyne in 1967.

After Lake Jindabyne was created, 99% of the river’s water was retained and diverted for power generation and irrigation.

The Chifley Labor Government promised the Snowy Hydro Scheme would deliver ‘cheap hydro-electric power‘ but when completed in 1974, the Snowy Mountains Scheme had cost $1.16 Billion (Ed: equivalent to perhaps $5 Billion in 2012 money – ^http://www.dollartimes.com/calculators/inflation.htm).

[Source:  ^http://www.powerhousemuseum.com/australia_innovates/?behaviour=view_article&Section_id=1020&article_id=10047]

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The Snowy Mountains Hydro Scheme (since abbreviated to ‘Snowy Hydro‘) consists of 16 major dams; 7 power stations; a pumping station; and 225 kilometres of tunnels, pipelines and aqueducts in the high country of New South Wales and Victoria .

The amount of electricity Snowy Hydro generates has always depended upon winter rains and mountain snow falls.  So, in times of drought, hydro output drops significantly. Snowy Hydro is dependent upon how much snow falls on the Australian Alps, and therefore how much water goes into predominantly lakes Eucumbene and Jindabyne.  In 2004-05, Snowy Hydro’s output was just 4,388 GWh (13.5% capacity) during a time of prolonged drought.

[Source:  ‘Why Snowy prefers to keep its water’, by Alan Kohler, 20060524, ^http://www.smh.com.au/news/business/why-snowy-prefers-to-keep-its-water/2006/05/23/1148150255347.html]

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As at 20111128, NSW hydro-electric power stations include four in the Snowy Scheme plus one at Shoalhaven and another at Warragamba:

1. Blowering  (Snowy Hydro)  80 MW
2. Guthega  (Snowy Hydro)  60 MW
3. Murray (Snowy Hydro)  1500 MW
4. Tumut  (Snowy Hydro)  2116 MW
5. Shoalhaven  (Eraring Energy)  240 MW
6. Warragamba   (Eraring Energy)  50 MW

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[Source: ‘Electricity generation’, NSW Government, ^http://www.trade.nsw.gov.au/energy/electricity/generation]

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Of the current 18,000 megawatts (MW) of installed electricity generation capacity of New South Wales, Snowy Hydro provides about 20% of NSW electricity, mainly to supply the additional power needed in morning and evening peak use.   Victoria’s hydroelectricity is sourced from the state’s major dams, including Lake Eildon, Hume and Dartmouth.   Overall, Snowy Hydro provides 17% of the electricity for south-eastern Australia and 5% of Australia’s total electricity generation (2007-08).

[Source:  ‘Hydroelectricity’, Victorian Government, ^http://www.dpi.vic.gov.au/energy/sustainable-energy/hydroelectricity]

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Tumut Pond Dam at Cabramurra

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The Snowy Mountains Scheme diverted and stopped the natural flows of major rivers including the Snowy and Tumut rivers. It caused irrevocable damage to a natural cherished landscape.    It created the Murray Irrigation Area and the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area which have collectively since been referred to as the Riverina, sustaining dozens of agricultural communities. In 1968 an entire town, Coleambally, was created as a result of the new flow of water.    Main cropping includes stone fruit, grain, and rice.

 

Murrumbidgee River Catchment

[Source: ^http://www.kathleenbowmer.com.au/pubs/fenner030531.htm]

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Over the decades, deforestation and excessive irrigation of the region has raised the salt table and caused extensive to dry land salinity, undermining the viability of irrigated cropping.

Dry Land Salinity

..caused by clearfell deforestation and excessive irrigation

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‘Beautiful memory of The Snowy’

Comment by ‘Quark’ on CanDoBetter.net, 20100131: 

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In 1975 I visited the Snowy with friends and camped in the area.

I remember swimming in the river. The water was about 1.5 metres deep, very clear with smooth white pebbles and rocks on the bottom. It was so clean and soft that I was drinking it as I swam and I remember thinking that my immersion in this element at that moment was sheer perfection. There was no-one else around.

This post dates the damming of the river but maybe they had let more water through and the irrigation demands were less than they are now.

More than a decade before when I was at school, one of our prescribed books was “Above the snow line”- a novel about the Snowy project and the immigrant workers. That was my introduction to this feat of engineering. I don’t recall the environmental impacts ever being discussed in class.

The following year my parents took me up to see the Snowy project on a guided motoring tour – I recall high dam walls turbines and things which meant little to me. I wouldn’t have known what had been lost in the creation of this scheme. I still have coloured photographs (slides) of this trip.

It was 1962.

Snowy River

[Source: ^http://forum.weatherzone.com.au/ubbthreads.php/topics/1095133/154]

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‘Bugger the bush mentality’

Comment by Tigerquoll on CanDoBetter.net, 20100201:

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Thanks Milly & Quark for your feedback.

Agriculture that profits from robbing resources (like potable water) from one region is inequitable. The Murray Valley, Riverina and Murray Darling irrigation regions are robbing Australia’s Alpine region of its water for artificial agriculture that is out of synch with its climate and so wholly dependent on artificial resources – water, fertilizer insecticides and GM.

It is State-sanctioned river theft underwritten by corrupt cronyism where politicians meter out favours to influential lobbyists that justify their claim on providing Australian export revenue and jobs – be it drought rice growers, drought citrus growers, drought orchards, drought dairy farmers.  And then they give us the dust storms as their topsoil is eroded. Why do we need so much milk, cheese and yoghurt on our supermarket shelves anyway? The supply is excessive to the extent that it is exported, so our primary industry policy has us ruining the Australian environment (river depletion, irrigation salinity/acidification) for export revenue. Primary Industry policy clearly has ripped up Triple Bottom Line accountability.

In 1975, I visited the Snowy with friends and camped in the area. I remember swimming in the river. The water was about 1.5 metres deep, very clear with smooth white pebbles and rocks on the bottom. It was so clean and soft that I was drinking it as I swam and I remember thinking that my immersion in this element at that moment was sheer perfection. There was no-one else around.

Spring Street will argue the food bowl utilitarian justification that river water from the bush is needed to feed the urban millions swelling from more arriving at Tullamarine like ants out of a nest. Only the human test is applied to resource allocation. The locals in the bush are ignored because the millions of votes are increasingly in the cities.

Quark, traditional Australian values like fresh stream water have been forgotten in urbane Australia. Melbourne’s water used to be the best. Now it is metallic with all the additives. Now they are ruining the Wonthaggi region and buggering its locals to cater for a desal plant for monstrous Melbourne.

The Snowy Scheme history should be re-written from the point of view of the promises versus the outcomes, and from the point of view of the benefits with the costs, and from the point of view of the national economy versus the local destruction.

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Australian 1950s politicians just copied big brother America, to emulate its hydro ‘progress’.

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Most of the employment went to immigrants. The sixteen dams were to provide irrigation to the Riverina and Murray-Goulburn to create a food bowl to feed a growing Melbourne and Sydney fuled by massive immigration. The turbine generated electricity was a secondary output. The seven power stations supply only 10% of the electricity for VIC and NSW, mush of which is lost over the hundreds of kilometres of transmission lines that have scarred many fragile ecosystems.

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The justification that Hydro-electricity is clean, efficient and renewable energy is wrong.

The Snowy Hydro Scheme cost $820 million (‘billion’ in 2012 money)  and destroyed vast river valleys.

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Building a dam effectively decommissions a wild river and the ecosystems it supports. The environmental damage is irreversible. Irreversible damage is not clean and not renewable. The only renewable aspect of hydro is rain re-filling artificial dams. Rivers are a non-renewable resource and the classification of hydro as a “renewable” energy source is a misnomer.

It’s a bugger the bush mentality.

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Tiger Quoll
Suggan Buggan
Snowy River Region
Victoria 3885
Australia

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Further Reading:

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[1]  ‘Oral history of the Snowy River‘, Snowy River Alliance, ^http://www.snowyriveralliance.com.au/reports/snowy%20enquiry/chap2.html

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[2]   Snowy Water Enquiry 1998, ^http://www.snowyhydro.com.au/levelTwo.asp?pageID=44&parentID=6

(Note:  Link since deleted by Snowy Hydro – this is what it read:  

‘The Snowy Water Inquiry was commissioned in 1998 with a brief to recommend environmental water release options to the Commonwealth, Victorian, and NSW Governments so that corporatisation of the Snowy Mountains Scheme could proceed. These release options related to the Snowy River below Jindabyne, the Murray River and other rivers associated with the Scheme. The Inquiry objectives were that the recommendations would not adversely impact on water supplies to existing irrigators or the viability of the Snowy Mountains Scheme.

The Commonwealth, Victorian and NSW governments will contribute $375 million over ten years to fund water-saving efficiency initiatives associated with the Murray and Murrumbidgee Irrigation Systems. These water-saving initiatives will subsequently reduce the amount of water to be released from the Scheme to the Murray and Murrumbidgee Rivers, thus allowing increased releases to the Snowy River below Jindabyne.

Environmental releases from the montane rivers will be equivalent to 150 GWh (gigawatt hours) of lost energy production from the Scheme each year. These releases are to be implemented at a similar rate to the releases to the Snowy River from Jindabyne. The combined impact of the Snowy, Murray and montane river releases will reduce generation from the Scheme by up to 540 GWh per year or an average of 11%.

Substantial outlet works have been built at Jindabyne and Tantangara Dams to allow for the environmental releases. Minor modifications to a number of aqueducts was also required to enable the environmental releases from the montane rivers to be implemented and measured.

Snowy Hydro is committed to the future of the Snowy Mountains Scheme and river health, while meeting the primary role of supplying renewable energy and water for irrigation.

Healthy rivers are vital to the Snowy Mountains Scheme for many reasons – our prosperity, our environment, our communities and our future depend on it.’

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The Snowy Water Inquiry Outcomes Implementation Deed (SWIOID), ^www.water.nsw.gov.au  [>Read Deed]

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[3]  Snowy River Alliance, ^http://www.snowyriveralliance.com.au/

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[4]  Man from Snowy River Museum, Corryong, Victoria’s High Country ^http://www.manfromsnowyrivermuseum.com/home/index.htm

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[5]  ‘Snowy River in dire straits‘, Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), Broadcast: 20100401, Reporter: Emma Griffiths, ^http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2010/s2863039.htm

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‘The massive floodwaters flowing out of Queensland into western New South Wales have revitalised the parched Murray Darling Basin – but the ailing snowy river in southern New South Wales won’t see a drop.’
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Transcript:
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KERRY O’BRIEN, PRESENTER: The massive floodwaters flowing out of Queensland into Western New South Wales are in the process of revitalising parts of the parched Murray-Darling basin at least.

But the ailing Snowy River in southern New South Wales won’t see a drop.  Its survival depends on water released from the massive Snowy Hydro system of dams, at the say-so of the New South Wales Government.

This past summer those flows have hit a high-water mark, with the biggest releases rushing down the Snowy since the hydro scheme was built in the 1960s.  But conservation groups say it hasn’t made up for the years of political neglect and broken promises that they say have left the Snowy in dire straits.

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Emma Griffiths reports.

JOHN GALLARD, SNOWY ALLIANCE: They said they were going to fix it. They haven’t fixed it.

SAM WILLIAMSON, BUSINESSMAN: We haven’t got a lot of water and everybody wants it, so who gets it? That is the fight at the moment isn’t it? Who gets the water?

EMMA GRIFFITHS, REPORTER: The Snowy River starts with a trickle in the highest of Australia’s High Country. Its tributaries form rocky creeks that gather in pace until they hit the massive system of dams and weirs that form the Snowy Hydro scheme, but this year the river has roared again.

JOHN GALLARD: We need a lot more flows like this to make the whole process worthwhile.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: John is a former park ranger. In retirement, the Snowy River has become his obsession.

JOHN GALLARD: It will make a little bit of a difference but it’s only a very small amount of water by comparison with what is needed.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: For two days this year the water has burst free of Jindabyne Dam.
In the biggest release since the Snowy scheme was built, 870 megalitres each day have flowed down the river. The extraordinary release was prompted by dire scientific warnings that isolated pools downstream were in danger of becoming stagnant.

JOHN GALLARD: It would be beautiful to have it every day but I don’t think there is any likelihood of that happening in the near future.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: Those who want to protect the river thought they had already fought the battle to save the Snowy and won.

Eight years ago the Commonwealth, along with Victoria and New South Wales, promised to let more water flow down the river purely for environmental reasons. But since then, the activists say, that promise has been forgotten and the Snowy is in worse trouble than ever.

JOHN GALLARD: You’ve got sections of river up there now that are totally dry for a major part of the season.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: Back in 2002 the governments in charge of the Snowy made a major political announcement. They closed the weir on one of the river’s main tributaries, the Mowamba. With much fanfare, then Premiers Bob Carr and Steve Bracks donned waders, unveiled a plaque and inspected the outcome of their decision – freely flowing water.

But three years later the weir was back in operation. The authorities say that was always the plan and now the river is again but a dribble.

JOHN GALLARD: Everybody thought it was going to be gone forever and we were going to have a free flowing river eventually. So you know, we are back to square one.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: One man who was there that day had doubts from the start.

SAM WILLIAMSON: I think eight years ago they were probably dreaming that it may rain, that we might have record snow falls. Maybe it was worth the promise, maybe not.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: Steve Williamson has been casting a line into the waters of the Snowy Mountains for more than 35 years and he has built successful fishing business out of the hobby he loves.

He doesn’t blame the politicians for the river’s woes. He doesn’t blame the Snowy Hydro. For him, the culprit is the drought.

SAM WILLIAMSON: There is only so much water in the glass and everybody wants – needs to learn to share it.

PHILIP COSTA, NSW WATER MINISTER: The best solution is for it to rain then we will all be very happy. It will certainly make my job a lot easier.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: As the New South Wales Water Minister, Philip Costa is the man largely responsible for determining who gets what out of the Snowy River system.

PHILIP COSTA: Some critics sometimes don’t accept the fact that we are in a drought. We are in a very severe drought. The drought has been around for some time now and what we have been doing is we have been putting water – as is the case now – down through the system when we can. When we have the available water.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: That political pledge eight years ago also centred on a commitment to increase the Snowy’s water allocation to 15 per cent of its original flows by this year. But the reality has fallen far short.

We’re getting 4 per cent – that’s all we are getting. That’s all we’ve got for 7 years since they have made the first environmental releases.

Unfortunately all of the agreements that they’ve made, we’ve found out are non-binding agreements.

PHILIP COSTA: We haven’t met what all the expectations might be simply because there isn’t enough water but we have delivered water to all of those discrete users and we do levit (phonetic) it in an equitable way. No one is getting more water than their share.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: The Murray River is a key beneficiary of the Snowy Hydro Scheme and those on the Eastern fall can’t help feeling short changed.

JOHN GALLARD: They’ve forgotten about the Snowy and now they’re saying to everybody they’re going to fix the Murray Darling system.

My comments are, this was the litmus test. They haven’t fixed this one, how are they possibly going to fix the Murray Darling system? They couldn’t even get the Snowy right.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: The Snowy River campaigners are determined to keep on fighting. But they have long ago recognised that even with more water and promised political action, they will never see the Snowy return to its glory days.

JOHN GALLARD: It’s a different river altogether. It’s a senile, old geriatric river now, whereas once it was very dynamic and quite dramatic. But it can be a relatively healthy river again and it can be much better than it is now.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: For some, the only solution is a hope shared Australia wide

SAM WILLIAMSON: The positive is it is going to rain one day, hopefully.

EMMA GRIFFITHS: And that’s what you are praying for?

SAM WILLIAMSON: We’re praying for it. That’d keep everybody happy.

KERRY O’BRIEN: That report from Emma Griffiths.

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Blowering Dam of the Tumut River, New South Wales, part of the Snowy Mountains Scheme.
Completed in 1968, the Blowering Dam holds 1,628,000 megalitres used for irrigation along the Murrumbidgee River, Yanco/Colombo/Billabong Creeks system, the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area and the Colleambally Irrigation Area. 

The Blowering Power Station delivers electricity generation capacity of just 80 megawatts (MW), which is 0.004% of the total electricity capacity of New South Wales (18,000 MW).

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[6]   ‘Snowy River back to a trickle – water turned off‘, Exploroz.com website, Comment submitted: Monday, Feb 20, 2006 at 16:46, by Member – Willie , Epping .Syd., ^http://www.exploroz.com/Forum/Topic/30970/SNOWY_RIVER_BACK_TO_A_TRICKLE_-_WATER_TURNED_OFF.aspx

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‘The Sydney Morning Herald Feb 18-19 carried a full page article on the fact that the flow in the Snowy River in February dropped from 275 megalitres to 70 overnight when the Hydro Scheme diverted the water from the Mowamba River back into their dams .

The SMH says no one new this was going to happen , but after doing some research and going to the site , ^http://www.snowyriveralliance.com.au/newsletter.htm#3
it appears that at least the people in the Snowy River Alliance new about it and had been making submissions to the Government to stop the flow being redirected in February .

Does anybody know the real story behind this ? Putting water back into the Snowy is a great project and I would like to try and help them somehow .

Cheers ,
Willie .

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[7]   ‘Reflections of a River‘ – The Snowy River, ^http://www.thesnowyriver.com/

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…”While most of the river runs through country that is largely uninhabited, the majority being protected by the Snowy River National Park, it’s flow was drastically reduced to less than 1% when the construction of The Snowy Mountains Hydro Electric Scheme was completed in the 1970′s.

Today the river is but a shallow of it’s former self.

It’s significance to Australian folk lore due to Banjo Patterson’s poem – The Man from Snowy River – establishes The Snowy River as a important part of our national identity.”

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The natural Snowy River

Circa 1890

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[8]  The making of a legend…

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‘The Man from Snowy River’

by A.B. “Banjo” Paterson
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There was movement at the station, for the word had passed around
That the colt from old Regret had got away,
And had joined the wild bush horses – he was worth a thousand pound,
So all the cracks had gathered to the fray.
All the tried and noted riders from the stations near and far
Had mustered at the homestead overnight,
For the bushmen love hard riding where the wild bush horses are,
And the stockhorse snuffs the battle with delight.
.
There was Harrison, who made his pile when Pardon won the cup,
The old man with his hair as white as snow;
But few could ride beside him when his blood was fairly up –
He would go wherever horse and man could go.
And Clancy of the Overflow came down to lend a hand,
No better horseman ever held the reins;
For never horse could throw him while the saddle girths would stand,
He learnt to ride while droving on the plains.
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And one was there, a stripling on a small and weedy beast,
He was something like a racehorse undersized,
With a touch of Timor pony – three parts thoroughbred at least –
And such as are by mountain horsemen prized.
He was hard and tough and wiry – just the sort that won’t say die –
There was courage in his quick impatient tread;
And he bore the badge of gameness in his bright and fiery eye,
And the proud and lofty carriage of his head.
.

But still so slight and weedy, one would doubt his power to stay,
And the old man said, “That horse will never do
For a long a tiring gallop – lad, you’d better stop away,
Those hills are far too rough for such as you.”
So he waited sad and wistful – only Clancy stood his friend –
“I think we ought to let him come,” he said;
“I warrant he’ll be with us when he’s wanted at the end,
For both his horse and he are mountain bred.
.

“He hails from Snowy River, up by Kosciusko’s side,
Where the hills are twice as steep and twice as rough,
Where a horse’s hoofs strike firelight from the flint stones every stride,
The man that holds his own is good enough.
And the Snowy River riders on the mountains make their home,
Where the river runs those giant hills between;
I have seen full many horsemen since I first commenced to roam,
But nowhere yet such horsemen have I seen.”
.

So he went – they found the horses by the big mimosa clump –
They raced away towards the mountain’s brow,
And the old man gave his orders, “Boys, go at them from the jump,
No use to try for fancy riding now.
And, Clancy, you must wheel them, try and wheel them to the right.
Ride boldly, lad, and never fear the spills,
For never yet was rider that could keep the mob in sight,
If once they gain the shelter of those hills.”
.

So Clancy rode to wheel them – he was racing on the wing
Where the best and boldest riders take their place,
And he raced his stockhorse past them, and he made the ranges ring
With the stockwhip, as he met them face to face.
Then they halted for a moment, while he swung the dreaded lash,
But they saw their well-loved mountain full in view,
And they charged beneath the stockwhip with a sharp and sudden dash,
And off into the mountain scrub they flew.
.

Then fast the horsemen followed, where the gorges deep and black
Resounded to the thunder of their tread,
And the stockwhips woke the echoes, and they fiercely answered back
From cliffs and crags that beetled overhead.
And upward, ever upward, the wild horses held their way,
Where mountain ash and kurrajong grew wide;
And the old man muttered fiercely, “We may bid the mob good day,
No man can hold them down the other side.”
.
When they reached the mountain’s summit, even Clancy took a pull,
It well might make the boldest hold their breath,
The wild hop scrub grew thickly, and the hidden ground was full
Of wombat holes, and any slip was death.
But the man from Snowy River let the pony have his head,
And he swung his stockwhip round and gave a cheer,
And he raced him down the mountain like a torrent down its bed,
While the others stood and watched in very fear.
.

He sent the flint stones flying, but the pony kept his feet,
He cleared the fallen timber in his stride,
And the man from Snowy River never shifted in his seat –
It was grand to see that mountain horseman ride.
Through the stringybarks and saplings, on the rough and broken ground,
Down the hillside at a racing pace he went;
And he never drew the bridle till he landed safe and sound,
At the bottom of that terrible descent.
.
He was right among the horses as they climbed the further hill,
And the watchers on the mountain standing mute,
Saw him ply the stockwhip fiercely, he was right among them still,
As he raced across the clearing in pursuit.
Then they lost him for a moment, where two mountain gullies met
In the ranges, but a final glimpse reveals
On a dim and distant hillside the wild horses racing yet,
With the man from Snowy River at their heels.
.
And he ran them single-handed till their sides were white with foam.
He followed like a bloodhound on their track,
Till they halted cowed and beaten, then he turned their heads for home,
And alone and unassisted brought them back.
But his hardy mountain pony he could scarcely raise a trot,
He was blood from hip to shoulder from the spur;
But his pluck was still undaunted, and his courage fiery hot,
For never yet was mountain horse a cur.
.
And down by Kosciusko, where the pine-clad ridges raise
Their torn and rugged battlements on high,
Where the air is clear as crystal, and the white stars fairly blaze
At midnight in the cold and frosty sky,
And where around The Overflow the reed beds sweep and sway
To the breezes, and the rolling plains are wide,
The man from Snowy River is a household word today,
And the stockmen tell the story of his ride.

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~ The Bulletin, 26 April 1890.

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In memory of Jack Riley

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Audio Readings of this magnificent pioneer poem:

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[a]  Australia’s Jack Thompson’s reading:  ^http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqyP3eKJ8p0

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[b]   Another reading:  ^http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fs_-DKUimeo

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