Posted by Tigerquoll:

The VicMolesters are at it again.

Chainsaw-wielding loggers of VicForests are set to target old growth Mountain Ash near Sylvia Creek in the Central Highlands, to Melbourne’s north, east of Kinglake.  That an inferno that was Black Saturday in February 2009 ripped through forests in the area around Narbethong, Toolangi and Kinglake matters squat to these woodchip mercenaries.

The Burned Area Emergency Response Report (BAER) commissioned by the Brumby Government after the 2009 bushfires recommended preserving refuge areas such as those in Toolangi for biodiversity recovery.

That the targeted forests have become isolated islands of habitat to rare wildlife matters squat to them.  That the forests are home to Victoria’s endangered and disappearing Leadbeater’s possum, the Spotted-Tail Quoll, the Sooty Owl, and Baw Baw frog are but collateral damage to these bastards. “Over half the Leadbeater’s Possum’s forest habitat was destroyed in the Black Saturday bushfires, so every last bit that survives is incredibly precious, and essential to this tiny animals’ survival,” said spokesperson for local group ‘My Environment’ Sarah Rees.

“The criteria the government is using to identify Leadbeater’s Possum habitat are too conservative. We’re talking about Victoria’s wildlife emblem, we should be making sure they multiply and flourish, not simply cling on to the edge of survival.”

VicForests old growth logging is all for a quick buck from woodchip sales to make Reflex Paper.  They would sell their daughters for less.

“DSE has confirmed the logging coupe contains old growth trees, even though VicForests and Government Minister Louise Asher insisted last week that it was not old growth forest,” said Wilderness Society forest campaigner Luke Chamberlain.

Tigerquoll
Suggan Buggan
Snowy River Region
Victoria 3885
Australia

A proper ‘National Park” – Yellowstone National Park, USA

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One hundred and thirty nine years ago in 1872, Yellowstone National Park was established in the United States of America, leading the world in national conservation..

Australia supposedly followed suit quickly afterwards in 1879, declaring The National Park just south of Sydney the second national park in the world.  It was renamed Royal National Park following Queen Elizabeth II’s visit  in 1954.

But it is one thing to be seen to be following America in environmental leadership.  It is publicly misleading to be disingenuous about ‘national‘ environmental protection.

A ‘vulnerable’ Royal National Park (New South Wales, Australia)…

National Parks in New South Wales are currently subject to the whims of incumbent State governments (both Labor and Liberal) and mining vested interests with such demands as to explore coal seam gas mining using fracking and chemical contamination from the likes of Apex Energy and Peabody Pacific’s joint Metropolitan Mine near Helensburgh in 2010.

National parks are typically large natural areas of land that are protected because they have unspoilt landscapes and a diverse number of native plants and animals. This means that commercial activities such as farming are prohibited and human activity is strictly monitored.  The purpose of the ‘national parks’ concept is to protect native flora and fauna and their habitat.

Victorian Alps

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Disturbingly, the powers that be in National Parks have grown a mindset that national parks are created primarily not for altruistic genuine conservation but for tourism – human use, benefit and exploitation.  The sell is that national parks “are also there so Australians and foreign visitors can enjoy and learn about our unique environment, heritage and culture.”

Australia has over 500 national parks covering some 28 million hectares accounting for 4% of Australia’s land mass.  But similarly disturbing is that the Australia legal concept of a ‘national park’ is one typically managed not by the national government, but a custodial responsibility delegated to the States and Territories of Australia. This means that across Australia, national parks are a hollow label for ‘reserve’, or in the case of Victoria’s Alpine National Park, an endless free cow paddock!

Cattle in the Alpine National Park?

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The state/territory custodial role for national parks is a left-over legacy from pre-Federation colonial Australia of the Nineteenth Century, in much the same way the Crown Land is a leftover legacy from when the Australian colonies were subservient to Britain.  And sure enough, the management records demonstrate that the spirit of national park protection has not been respected by the state and territory custodial governments.

National Park ‘protection’ in the United States has national clout.  But in Australia the term is politically expedient and superficial.  This has caused the conservation movement to increasingly look to UNESCO World Heritage, because state and territory governments cannoit be trusted.   ‘National park’ status has become meaningless.  Just consider the Kakadu, Kosciuszko, and the Great Barrier Reef national parks and their abuse and mismanagement legacies!

Alpine National Park

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Media Release by the National Parks Association of NSW:

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‘National Parks to be given national status’

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National Parks Association of NSW CEO, Kevin Evans, has welcomed moves by Federal environment minister Tony Burke to add Commonwealth protection to Australia’s national parks.
“Stronger Federal protection for national parks is a groundbreaking  move that will ensure the long-term integrity of Australia’s most loved natural places and vital habitat for threatened plants and animals,” Mr. Evans said.
“It will also make sure that politically motivated interference in park protection, including proposals for inappropriate tourism infrastructure, mining, cattle grazing and hunting will be more difficult in the future.
“We need to be clear that such proposals are not in the national interest,” Mr. Evans said. “Our protected areas are part of much bigger systems working at a landscape scale as the corner stone of Australia’s biodiversity conservation strategy.”
Speaking at the Sydney Institute on Thursday evening, Mr. Burke said “that there was a principle that once an area was protected there shall be no backward steps”.

He referred to the move by the Victorian government to return cattle to the Alpine National Parks earlier this year as treating a national park like a farm.

“Importantly, if implemented, this proposal would allow Australia to honour its commitment to international treaties designed to protect the world’s natural heritage” Mr. Evans said.
“It won’t change the way national parks are managed but as the minister says, it will make sure that there will be ‘no backward steps’ in that management.
“Most people already assume that national parks have national protection, as they do in most countries of the world. But almost all of our most important natural areas are actually set up and managed under the laws of each state and territory.”
Minister Burke announced last night that he has written to all states and territories seeking their views on a plan to amend federal laws to better protect national parks.
NPA encourages the NSW government to cooperate with the Federal environment minister on his proposal.
“Under the proposed federal law, states will still be in control of setting park boundaries, and there will be no change to existing activities in parks,” said Mr. Evans.
Mr. Evans said,

“What it does mean is that the protection offered by state laws will be backed up by national law.”

Our national parks will be truly part of our national heritage, securely protected by all Australians, for all Australians, for all time.

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Editor’s comments:

This revelation confirms that Australians have been hoodwinked about ‘National Park Protection’ since 1879.

It one of the biggest greenwashing cons in Australian history. National Parks are but a convenient propaganda label until alternative land use demands are proposed.

The message is that the States and Territories simply cannot be trusted with Australia’s valuable natural heritage.

So if such jurisdictions are so unrepresentative of Australian values, then why do the States and Territories continue to exist?

Sunrise on Mount Feathertop, Alpine National Park, Victoria

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Background:

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‘High country ought stay a cattle no-go zone’

by Geoff Mosley, 20110308, The Age

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‘The Baillieu government’s decision to reintroduce cattle into the Alpine National Park not only snubs 80 years of research highlighting the environmental damage they can do, it also undermines co-operative management of Australia’s alpine parks.  This move was undertaken without any consultation with the federal government and, since the Alpine National Park is on the National Heritage List, all eyes are on whether Environment Minister Tony Burke will intervene to protect the area’s nationally significant natural heritage values.

Victorian Premier, Ted Ballieu

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In  deciding,  Burke must take into account strong opposition to the Baillieu government’s move from the Australian Academy of Science and the World Commission on Protected Areas. These organisations have pointed to the bad example it would set when more than 3000 people attend the World National Parks Congress in Melbourne in 2014.

The planned ‘‘study’’ was also criticised by Melbourne University’s School of Land and Environment, whose acting head, associate professor Gerd Bossinger, said in an email: ‘‘much of the work being proposed has already been done’’. This response elicited a threat from the Baillieu government over millions of dollars in research funding.

Burke should also consider the damage that Victoria’s action would do to the co-ordinated approach to interstate management of the alpine parks, which has operated since 1986.

The states have been in charge of public land, including national parks, which by then had been established in several states, since Federation in 1901.  Federation also introduced a possible role for the federal government in encouraging co-operative endeavours in heritage protection.

Co-operation did not come easily. The first initiative for a cross-state national park in the Alps came from the environment movement.

But, in 1943, the Victorian government rejected the proposed ‘Snowy-Indi National Park‘, embracing parts of the NSW  (17,200 ha) and Victoria’s high country (22,000 ha),  because of the ‘‘dangers to which large areas of country would be exposed by prohibiting occupation’’ – whatever that meant.

Instead the individual states established separate protected areas in their territories – Kosciusko State Park in 1944 (which became Kosciusko National Park in 1967), Gudgenby Nature Reserve  in 1979 (became Namadgi National Park in 1984), and the Alpine National Park (formed from several disparate parks) in 1989.

The case for co-operative management of these adjacent alpine parks was obvious but who would initiate it?

The potential for Commonwealth leadership in such an enterprise was  greatly increased in the 1970s with the passage of legislation to protect the national estate and with Australia’s ratification in 1974 of the World Heritage Convention. Apart from Queensland’s Great Barrier Reef and south-west Tasmania, there appeared to be no part of Australia more deserving of such a federal commitment than the Alps.

A clear case in point was the need for a uniform approach to alpine grazing. NSW ended the practice in Kosciusko National Park in 1969.  The ACT followed suit.  But the Victorian government dithered. So in 1984,  I, as then director of the Australian Conservation Foundation, took 15 Victorian MPs on a tour of Kosciusko National Park. The visitors were so impressed by the recovery of the land after the removal of grazing that they agreed on a ‘‘Memorandum of Understanding for Co-operative Management of the Australian Alps National Parks’’, signed on July 15, 1986.

After an extensive review, in 2006 the Victorian government terminated the last of several of grazing licences in the Alpine National Park, bringing the state into line with NSW and the ACT. The Baillieu government’s reintroduction of grazing puts this hard-won co-operation in jeopardy.

Tony Burke’s decision also has consequences for the fate of the world heritage-listing proposal,  in limbo since prime minister Bob Hawke announced in 1989 that the Australian Alps would be assessed.

World heritage listing of the Alps and adjacent forests – the ‘‘sea to snow concept’’ – would give the federal government enhanced power to act as Hawke did in 1983 to stop the Franklin Dam in Tasmania’s Wilderness World Heritage Area. Five reports later and nothing has happened. Meanwhile, the presence of cattle in the Alpine National Park could mean that a nomination would fail the ‘‘integrity’’ test for  listing.

Burke has an opportunity to not only protect the Alpine National Park but to advance the overall cause of  national heritage protection.  If the word ‘‘national’’ means anything, he must do the right thing by the people of Australia and send the cattle back down the hill.’

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Further Reading:

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[1]   ‘Burke demands a halt to alpine cattle grazing‘, 20110318, ABC Rural, ^http://www.abc.net.au/rural/news/content/201103/s3167854.htm

[2]   ‘High country ought stay a cattle no-go zone‘,  by Geoff Mosley, 20110308, ^http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/high-country-ought-stay-a-cattle-nogo-zone-20110307-1bka1.html

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(All references accessed 20110722)

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© Photo EEG 2009

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Radiocarbon-testing has confirmed that a giant rare old-growth Eucalyptus regnans located in its natural forest habitat on East Gippsland’s Brown Mountain has been chainsawed by VicForests, despite it being scientifically confirmed to be at least 500 years old.

No regard has been made for the existence value of a Victorian 500 year old natural asset, nor the habitat requirements for the typical arboreal animals and forest owls dependent on this old growth habitat tree or its associative forest dependent habitat. Under State-

sanction, ignorant VicForest butchers have plundered, ransacked and run.

© Photo EEG 2009

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Manager, Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment, Orbost, Steve DeVoogd, has been formally advised that this chainsawing of rare old growth forest is an offence committed under the section 46(1) of the Sustainable Forests (Timber) Act 2004. The action is also a breach of Code of Forest Practices (CFP).  VicForests Chairman, Warren Hodgson, Board members Monica Gould, Jim Houghton, Fiona McNabb, Bob Smith, Susan Walpole, and Chief Executive Officer David Pollard should all be sacked forthwith. VicForests token ‘vision’ ‘purpose’ and ‘values’ which profess motherhood notions of ‘sustainable’, ‘environmentally responsible’ and ‘ethical’ are but ‘Mugabean’. This 500 year old tree epitomises the reality of Brumby’s ‘Sustainability Charter for State forests.

Botanist Steve Mueck has worked for the Victorian Department of Natural Resources and Environment and is now a consultant in the private sector. He says radiocarbon dating of eucalypts is unusual and the result in this case is significant.

“Current forest managements practices are looking at harvesting on rotation times in the vicinity of 80 to 120 years with the perception that that’s a particularly long period of time,” he said.

“Now it is, I suppose, in the context of a human lifetime, but it is a very, very short period of time in comparison to the age in which many of the components that live in these forests can in fact get to in a natural system.”

Back in the 1860s timber workers and naturalists emerged from the forests with stories of massive trees towering to immense heights and as wide as houses.

Government botanist Ferdinand von Mueller recounted the existence of a tree as high as the Egyptian Pyramids at 480 ft (144m) and another fallen tree in the Dandenong Ranges over 400 ft (120m). A giant was sighted in the Otways with a girth of 64 ft (19m).

VicForests senseless decapitation of one of the last Victorian giants is a harbinger of extinction to Victoria’s old growth forests.

It’s like grabbing an old ANZAC from a ‘march past’ and slitting his throat.

© Photo EEG 2009

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Comments:

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‘Victorian Labor’s “sustainable” principles are thin and shallow’

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In 2006 the Labor Party pledged to “protect remaining significant stands of old growth forest currently available for timber harvesting by including them in the National Parks and reserves system”.

This promise was blatantly broken.

The trees on of Brown Mountain have not burned for 200 years despite repeated fire threats. The resistance of these old forests to bushfire is evident. This area is also the home of several highly endangered native species.

Clear felling of old growth forests has continued despite their critical role in storing carbon and providing water for the depleted Snowy River catchment.

The Victorian government states that 90% of our forests are preserved.  However, only 16% of Victoria is protected, and over 80 percent of what is logged in East Gippsland ends up as mere woodchips!

Clearing 10% of our forests is plainly too much considering that Victoria remains the most cleared and damaged State of Australia.

Our Brumby government is guilty of serious eco-destruction and policy violation, and any claims of “sustainable” principles are demonstrated to be thin and shallow.

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– end of article –

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Australia’s unsustainable reactive policy of coping with immigration is failing Australians, Australia’s environment and Australia’s cultural way of life.

The naive open flood gate policy does just that – floods thousands of new people onto an existing society, existing land use, existing resources, existing infrastructure and existing services. The federal policy has no sense of ownership of the impacts of immigration, it just issues the visas, savours its sense of international cred, but handballs the consequential problems to states, who don’t know what’s hit ’em.

Something has to crack. Sydney has cracked in many ways – housing affordability is shot, rail is rundown and over-congested, roads are at gridlock, health is technically insolvent, and every state government service is overstretched. Then we see the Cronulla riots and the drive by ethic shootings in Sydney’s outer south west. Ethnic ghettos plague Sydney and the cost of crime and of Australian gaols increasingly corrode and over-burden the community.

The problem is the skin deep immigration policy and the systemic absence of population planning. The Australian federal government or decades has been internationally irresponsible both to its existing population mix but also to new arrivals. Neither deserve its institutional neglect and the Australian government must be internationally held to account. It’s time for an holistic total lifecycle approach that looks at all the needs, costs, issues and desired outcomes of immigration on Australia’s society.

Clearly, the ghetto models in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth are recipes for civil unrest.
So perhaps a best practice approach should involve taking a look at one of Australia’s existing examples of a healthy regional community model in Australia in toto. Identify the region’s use and needs in terms of its land use, resources, infrastructure and services. Fully cost those for that region and then apportion this to the healthly population size that region supports.

Let’s suggest the Mackay Region in North Queensland. Go to the website:

http://www.mackayregion.com/

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“The region as a whole, is home to 143,000 friendly and welcoming people and the relaxed tropical city of Mackay has a population in excess of 80,000. It is no wonder the region can offer such an abundant range of services and facilities. Our vibrant developing community can proudly boast being a City where people can pursue a wide range of interests and lifestyles in a secure environment.”

OK, so let’s assume this is as good as an Australian region gets. So let’s evaluate this as a regional population standard. Then for every 143,000 immigrants into Australia, the equivalent full complement of community landscape, resources, infrastructure and services that blesses the Mackay Region is made available and constructed up front by the federal government. No compromise.

Perhaps the federal Government will then start to wake up to the true holistic cost of integrated immigration.

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Comments:

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‘State governments not innocent victims of imposed immigration’

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Tigerquoll, this is a fantastic idea.

However your words,

“(The federal Government) just issues the visas, savours its sense of international cred, but handballs the consequential problems to states, who don’t know what’s hit em”.

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… may unintentionally imply that state Governments, particularly Queensland and Victoria do not, themselves, actively clamour for immigrants in spite of the serious problems that immigration causes as you have pointed out.

Peter Beattie, Queensland Premier until 2008 and Anna Bligh his successor have been playing a game with the Queensland public of bringing about Queensland’s population growth, but avoiding the political consequences of having done so. This is partially explored in my article “Exposing Queensland Government population growth duplicity” of 1 Apr 09.

One way, Beattie achieved this was to publicly take a number of different, and mutually contradictory, stances on population growth. On some occasions he would simply say that population growth was nothing but wonderful (see, for example, Queensland Government advertisement of 8 Dec 05).

On other occasions he would act like a a kind of welcoming good-natured host for Queensland’s of interstate arrivals, although one working his hardest to stay ahead of the challenges that he had not sought himself.

On yet other occasions, he would attempt to evade political responsibility for long hospital waiting lists, under-resourced schools, traffic congestion, electricity blackouts, the water crisis by correctly (up to a point) pointing outing out that they were caused by population growth. (In reality his own astonishingly inept handling of his responsibilities seriously compounded the problems caused by population growth. Ex-Labor MP Cate Molloy has provided evidence of his complete failure to do anything about the looming water crisis until it was almost too late as just one example.)

So, in fact, state governments are not the wholly innocent victims of Rudd’s reckless program of high immigration.

Many in the third world have better served by corrupt dictators than the people of Australia are now being served by its state and federal leaders.

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– end of article –

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On Thursday 26th March 2009, four people were charged in their efforts to save East Gippsland old growth forests at Upper Delegate River from being chopped down.

‘The Goongerah Blockade’

Conservationists trying to conserve protected old growth forests have been charged with illegal conservation. Is Victorian Premier Brumby’s strongman stance seeking to emulate Mugabean democracy?

Is Brumby’s hypocritical law for conservationists that of prima facie guilt of conservation? Surely the need to conserve rare and remnant old growth forests makes conservation self-evident?

Premier Brumby’s DSE and VicForests under their own laws maintain these catchment forests under environmental protection legislation. Yet in breach of their own laws, Brumby’s environmental watchdogs have become lapdogs, watching loggers irreparably destroy these centuries-old Eucalypts and lay witness to Victoria’s disappearing natural heritage. It’s no different to Indonesia condoning destruction of Sumatran and Kalimantan rainforests.

When was the last time Brumby bushwalked through old growth Gippsland? Last year, or never?

A dedicated group of 20 forest conservationists prevented clearfelling in the upper Delegate River catchment up until now. “This particular old growth forest was recently surveyed by trained biologists and the result showed very high density of tree dwelling mammals”, said spokesperson for the group Carmel Roberts.

“The DSE is neglecting their responsibilities to protect endangered wildlife habitat, even though it clearly states in their Forest Management Plan that where high numbers of threatened species are found, habitat must be protected.

“The DSE are saying they are unable to protect these species’ habitat despite the logging being in clear breach of their legal obligations. The government puts more value on a months work by a few people than protecting endangered wildlife from extinction.

“In 2006, Premier Brumby made an election promise to protect the “last significant stands of old growth”. These forests are the very the last refuges for our rare species.”

“Since the devastation caused by the bushfires, East Gippsland’s forests are now even more critical to the survival of Victoria’s native species than before. Rare native wildlife could have been made locally extinct in other areas due to the fire damage.”

“Old growth forest habitats such as hollow-bearing trees, are critically important for the survival of these threatened species in Victoria. The logging industry can survive in plantations and regrowth, endangered wildlife can’t.”

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Comments:

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Woodchip mafia has Brumby well trained

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The Brumby government is truly the lapdog to the loggers. The woodchip mafia has him well trained. The rule book says the threatened species have to be saved. He destroys them and their habitat. The promise back in 2006 was to save the old growth – but all he’s done is cover for the increased targeting of prime areas.

Yep – no different to Indonesia or the Amazon. Only Brumby employs better media spin experts. Pity the public don’t wear it.

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Lap dog governments are following Easter Island

Blackdog’s comments hit the mark.

I go further than black dog.

Lap dog governments are supporting destructionist loggers while publicly advocating environmental protection in another department.

This is gross hypocracy, a conflict of interest and corrupt.

I worry also that as more clever HSC graduates take on degrees in ‘communications’, which so frequently entices them into well paid jobs in government and corporate spin machines, that pure ethics is neglected at both senior school and at most university courses.

By denying our children skills and wisdom in worldly ethics, our children are being denied their rights to cope with ethical decisions. A degree without a base in ethics is a degree in propaganda, and don’t our lapdog governments lap them up?

Take the following example and ask why in our education system and supposed independent journalism, that Australians are more aware of the extremely rich celebrities than the natural and indigenous exploitation and neglect condoned by governmenst in Australia’s World region?

SOURCE: www.drmartinwilliams.com/conservation-and-environment/indonesian-forest-destruction-corruption-plays-a-role.html

“Since 1982, forest fires on a large scale in Kalimantan, Sumatra and Java have come with the onset of each dry season. A fire in Kalimantan in 1983, reportedly the largest in human history, destroyed 3.7 million hectares of rainforest, an area the size of the Netherlands.

In 1987, 2 million hectares, 1.4 million of primary rainforest, were destroyed in Kalimantan, Sumatra, East Timor, Sulawesi and mountain regions of Java.

In 1991 smoke and ash from fires blanketed Singapore, Malaysia and the Straits of Malacca, forcing Indonesia to call for international help.

Forest fires of this magnitude coincide with a rapid increase in logging and plantation activities which began in the early 1980s. In 1966, 82% of Indonesia’s land mass was covered by primary forest. By 1982 this had shrunk to 68%, and recent satellite photographs indicate that forest cover – including timber plantations – is now down to about 55%.

In late 1996, the Indonesian minister of forests said that 20 million hectares of forest were in a critical state and warned that this was increasing rapidly. The World Bank estimates 800,000 hectares of forest are lost each year.

Around 64 million hectares – one-third of Indonesia’s land mass – is devoted to commercial logging. In 1996 Indonesia became the world’s largest plywood exporter.
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On September 9, Suharto reissued a 1995 ban on burning forest and called on the military to help enforce it. Companies were given until October 3 to prove they were not the culprits.

Laws allow up to 10 years’ imprisonment and a 100 million rupiah fine for polluters. Not one company, however, has ever been convicted. Even the environment minister, Sarwono Kusumaatmadja, admitted to Reuters on September 22 that environmental laws are not policed properly.

Soon after Suharto’s announcement, the number of fires increased, as companies rushed to clear as much land as possible before the deadline. Even if the deadline was strictly adhered to, it would only let companies finish clearing land at a time the normal rainy season would have forced them to do so.

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But it is not just the greed of Suharto and the logging and plantation firms which has created this disaster.

Government investment and development policies which have promoted destructive land clearing practices are spurred on by market forces and capitalism’s endless drive for profit. Many of the projects were championed by and funded by institutions such as the World Bank and the IMF, which pressure countries such as Indonesia to increase exports.”

In 2009, we must learn from Easter Island’s ancient community and its unsustainable culture of nature exploitation which ended up condemning its civilization to extinction. Else, despite our iPods, in 2009 we risk the same fate.

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Injustice rules the forests

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About time this shameful situation got coverage. I would like to see a story for EVERY charge against conservationists on candobetter.

It is quite true, as you say, that the Victorian Government frequently breaks the law in its forest activities. In fact it has practically torn up its own rule book.

Keep fighting!

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The duty of fire fighting is to detect, control and suppress fires..

If bushfire fighting cannot do this reliably outside the urban environment, then the bushfire fighting promise has become a community lie and a deadly one at that..

This is a duty, irrespective of who is charged with the responsibility – government professionals, local volunteers, outsourced contractors, whomever?
But people in the bush are dying in their homes and in their cars, irreplaceable property has gone forever, and vast valleys and ridges of Australia’s rare ecosystems are being incinerated into extinction.
Australia’s post-war Dad’s Army model has long become ineffective.  It has become a reckless and incompetent menace luring vulnerable bush communities into a false sense of security and trust, to their death..
It is long time that Australia’s post-1939 Black Friday bushfire fighting mentality, resourcing and infrastructure were challenged by communities!

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Out of the media frenzy to get ratings out of the Victorian bushfires, a ‘so-called’ bushfire expert on an ABC 730 Report panel (David Packham) advocated a 6 to 7 fold increase in prescribed burning for Victoria.

Another neo-Dreamtime wizard?

The effectiveness of this strategy is undermined by the live evidence shown (on ABC 730 Report Thursday 12-Feb-09) of local resident Jim Baruta in his home video. Over 200m of clear paddock stood between the bush and his house. This represents hazard reduction to an extreme degree (no trees or undergrowth for 200 m). Yet it was ineffective defence. Only his bunker saved his life.

As the ‘heat’ of the tragedy cools down, one of the overlooked impacts that needs to be considered in a balanced way is the impacts of broad scale fire (prescribed, wild, arson or otherwise) is having on the habitat of ground dwelling mammals. In the search for answers to avoid a repetition of the firestorm it is important that natural areas of high conservation value including old growth forests receive due recognition as natural assets worth protecting. Its integrity is not being measured and is probably disappearing through fire at a rate comparable to what logging is causing in SE Asia. That the bush grows back is not an indicator of its biodiversity health.

One must recognise that the bush (habitat) is also the innocent victim of these horrific fires. Dense ground cover is a fuel for fire but also home for wildlife. Keep removing the fuel and one removes the wildlife- eventually to its mass extinction. The underlying causes of the fires are the ignition, the lack of non-burnable material to create a buffer between good bush and human settlement, the slow detection of ignitions, the slow response to these while still manageable (remote country or otherwise) and the inadequate resources to suppress many spot fires. As to the ignition cause being arson – Australia needs a serious permanent criminology unit dedicated to this crime. The media and our leaders need to be careful not to incite dormant serial arsonists – just like one read and watched in the days preceding the first arson attack at Delburn on 29 Jan. The media frenzy just fuelled the copy cats’ excitement.

Bushfire management is a complex issue, so poorly under resourced, so poorly disconnected from bushfire research, yet so integrated into the lives of so many Australians. The public deserve a say into the Royal Commission. Those who tragically died and lost everything deserve billions not just in recovery but in the whole task of bushfire management.

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Comments:

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Re: Prescribed burning

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I don’t doubt your commitment to the environment, but you’ve got it exactly backwards. Increased burning is exactly what we need. Not just for human safety, but because the Australian ecology depends on fire at the very least as a means of recycling dead matter (The Australian ecology is different from many others in that our lack of water tends to inhibit microbial decomposition – as a result fire takes on that role).

There are many other reasons, as well. The natural adaptation of Australian plants to fire means that fire suppression actually helps drive native species to extinction, as they are out-competed by faster growing, more prolific seed spreading imported weeds. This is often accompanied by native animals being pushed out in the same fashion.

But the weeds, by putting their effort into spreading widely, have few resources left to recover from periodic annihilation events (like bushfires), meaning that where the bush burns periodically, native plants and wildlife have a natural advantage. Strange as it may sound, continual fire protects native species.

So long as the fires are not the huge events that just happened, of course. Continual small fires (such as aboriginals lit – look up “firestick farming”) has proven to be best. This is not to say that exactly the same areas should be burned each time, of course.

An early paper of Tim Flannery’s on the subject would be a good introduction to the historical importance of fire, and how it relates to the rest of the Australian environment – please don’t be put off by the windy title: “The Timing, Nature, and Aftershock of Pleistocene Extinctions in Australia” (^http://www.amnh.org/science/biodiversity/extinction/Day2/bytes/FlanneryPres.html)

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Lies, damn lies, and bushphobic myths

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Burning native habitat is State-sanctioned arson.  If not, then perhaps Matthew in his claims above can offer verifiable ecological authority behind the myths he relies upon to justify why deliberatly setting fire to native habitat is ‘good’ for it?
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Myth 1: “Increased burning is exactly what we need.”

Arsonist profess this, so how do you differentiate yourself? Arsonists feel good about lighting fires.
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Myth 2: Bushfire is “good for human safety.”

Ambit claims deserve no more than single words rebuffs like: ‘crap’. But politely, I offer a more reasoned response.

Many prescribed burns actually get out of control and become the threat to human safety they are trying to avoid. Human safety is about not building in bushfire prone areas and not using materials that burn. Why is this logical solution avoided? If you choose to build in the bush and then burn the bush so that there is no bush around to burn, have you ust defeated your purpose of building in the bush? Bushfires burn down houses mainly fronm ember attack which can travel by winds many kilometres, so to remove the threat of ember attack, how many kilometres circumference of bush do you need to destroy to feel safe – 3km, 10km? You may as well build you house on farm land with no trees, undergrowth or grass in sight. Then you may be safe from ember attack. Think of the St Andrews example during the February Victorian Bushfires.

Bushfire fighting is all about rapid detecton, response and suppression of ignitions. Currently most bushfires are detected by thoughtful members of the public calling 000, then volunteers are called in and drive out in fire trucks. What are the performance statistics for say 2008 for all ignitions in Victoria in terms of elapsed time between estimated ignition time and response on site? Hours? Days? Such delays are not good for human safety or habitat.
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Myth 3: “Australian ecology depends on fire”

Another ambit claim and so I say, crap. Name your ecological authority? Name species of flora that are threatened with extinction due the lack of fire? Name species of fauna that are fire dependent and relish being burns victims and displaced for years due to habitat destruction by fire?

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Myth 4: “The natural adaptation of Australian plants to fire means that fire suppression actually helps drive native species to extinction, as they are outcompeted by faster growing, more prolific seed spreading imported weeds. This is often accompanied by native animals being pushed out in the same fashion.”

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So you are now claiming bushfires are good because weeds grow faster than native plants. How is putting out bushfires logically connected to weeds? I am being really patient now.

Some Australian flora have become more fire tolerant that others, but others remain sensitive to fire and vulnerable to fire. This generalist claim disregards the complexity of biodoversity. It’s like claiming the bush growns back and so must be ok. Again, what ecological authority do you base you claim?

How does putting out bushfires (fire suppression) “drive native species to extinction”?

Weeds do not invade undisturbed bush easily – there is too much bush in the way. Heavy rain after burning will leave exposed subsoils and attracted weeds, but bushfire authorities who engage in prescribed burning abrogate themselves of responsibility for follow up weeding – ‘not our problem’ they say.
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Myth 5: “Strange as it may sound, continual fire protects native species.”

Really strange this one. What ecological source, evidence, location do you have for this claim?

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Myth 6: Aboriginal firestick farming has proven to be best.

Small mosaic occasional fires have prevailed across Australia, but the frequency and scale of that applied since 1788 has been a thousand fold – hardly comparable. Now we have a fraction of the good bush left, so hardly a comparable practice when we only have islands of the original natural landscape left.

Referring to Tim Flannery’s book is a start as a source, but what argument are you drawing upon? Name dropping is not supporting evidence.

Matthew, here’s some an ecological authority to counter your myth that ‘fire stick farming’ is an age old environmental condition “best” for the Australian bush.

“Professor Gell has uncovered evidence that the incidence of fires increased dramatically with the arrival of Europeans after the 1830s. Contrary to conventional beliefs, he says, the first squatters burnt the land far more regularly than Aborigines ever did.”    [Source: “Researcher questions fire strategy” by Geoff Maslen in the SMH of 23 Mar 09, ^http://www.theage.com.au/national/researcher-questions-fire-strategy-20090323-96e2.html]

One must recognise that the bush (habitat) is also the innocent victim of bushfires, so how can you argue fire is good when the bush burns and by burning is killed, habitat lost and native animals burned alive, displaced because home ranges of native mammals are not transportable?

Think of a ‘home range’ like a farm dog chained to a tree – it can’t just walk to the next hill to escape fire. Home ranges are geographically fixed. Fire destroys them and the animals do know to move elsewhere. They may roam to feed but return to their burnt out home after feeding – exposed and so many die.  I can cite evidence if you want.

Simplistic myths trying to generalise bushfires being good for Australia’s native flora and fauna are overdue their time of reckoning. Bushfire authorities simply are flying blind with no ecological idea of what they do.

The CFA in Victoria and RFS in NSW have become more adept at letting remote fire burn millions of hectares of native habitat and to lighting prescribed burns systematically every year, to the extent that bushfirefghting has forgotten its core task of bushfire suppression and supplanted it with prescribed burning.
This is defeatist. Perhaps the CFA now stands for Country Fire Arsonists and the RFS stands for Rural Fire Starters?

Notably not a Australian native zoologist among them.

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Researcher questions fire strategy‘

A leading bushfire researcher has questioned calls for more frequent controlled burn-offs, saying they may make our forests more prone to large blazes.

The director of the centre for environmental management at the University of Ballarat, Professor Peter Gell, says frequent burning of Victoria’s forests may have resulted in bushfires becoming more frequent and more intense.  Professor Gell has uncovered evidence that the incidence of fires increased dramatically with the arrival of Europeans after the 1830s.

Contrary to conventional beliefs, he says, the first squatters burnt the land far more regularly than Aborigines ever did.

“This may have created a situation where the frequent burning of forests early on changed the plants on the forest floor to create fire-provoking vegetation rather than reducing it.”

Professor Peter Gell is convener of a national network of scientists examining the affects of humans on Australia’s ecosystems. He also heads an international network of researchers on the effects of people on the world’s lakes

“At Ballarat, we are looking at fire history and we believe the incidence of fires markedly increased after Europeans arrived. The first squatters burnt more regularly than the indigenous people and might actually have increased the interaction between fire and vegetation rather than reduced it.”

Victoria’s early settlers turned most of the original forests into woodland and most of the woodland into grassland, Professor Gell says.  So although the total “fuel load” has decreased, conditions for bushfires within the remaining forests are different now than they were 300 years ago.

“If we are facing a new climate and increasingly extreme and catastrophic fire hazards, fuel reduction burning may be doing little to restrict the passage of fires,” he says.

“It’s also possible that fuel reduction burning will become so frequent or excessive that biodiversity is completely sacrificed because the shrub layer that is critical for most of our rare and endangered birds and animals will be destroyed.”

Professor Gell says that governments are investing enormous sums of money in trying to maintain biodiversity, soil stabilisation and water quality. But these are all negatively affected by regular burning.

“If you burn every year or two, you could be throwing the baby out with the bathwater.” .

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– end of article –

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The Australian Institute of Criminology reported last month that half of Australian bushfires are deliberately lit. Bushfire research needs to go further to evaluate whether in fact of the most damaging most are deliberately lit.

Test: If one excluded arson ignitions and their related spotover fires (between 29 Jan at Delburn to 8 Feb) would the firestorms have occurred?

Assuming the answer is no, then clearly arson must be Australia’s key focus in combating the impacts of bushfire.

Unlike the other two causes of bushfire, (lightning and accident) which are random, bush arson targets the worst conditions, upwind of a specific target and often involving multiple ignitions.

The term ‘fire bug’ is too docile and to start seriously dealing with it, we must change the perception and the language. Bush arson has become so deadly and catastrophic a crime that it warrants the term ‘pyroterrorism‘. See the application of this term in the recent California fires.
^http://www.lilith-ezine.com/articles/thepyroterroristsarecoming.html

The forthcoming Royal Commission into the Victorian Bushfires of 2009 risks concluding similar theme recommendations as the 2004 COAG Enquiry into the 2003 Canberra Firestorm, which itself repeated those of many previous bushfire enquiries. The implementation of any recommendations requires budget, timeframe and an independent federal watchdog accountable to the public. I will be analysing its terms of reference.

Aside from serious resourcing of bush fire fighting (nationalising it, building approvals, building codes, etc), the key systemic problem is the cultural disconnect between bushfire research and fire fighting practice. Criminal arson investigation needs to be a permanent and dedicated arm of bushfire management, properly resourced with primary data collected from all Australia and overseas using the best criminal psychologists and with a proactive mandate.

In NSW, the government set up Strike Force Tronto to investigate serial bush arsonist after the Christmas 2001 bushfires. Then the government got complacent, other priorities emerged and it was disbanded in 2005. But following a series of arson bushfires in 2006 (with houses lost in (Picton and Cattai) the force was reinstated on 26 Sep 06 (Daily Telegraph p1). Reactive sporadic resourcing of bush arson investigation clearly isn’t effective.

To seriously address the main cause of deadly bushfires, a national organisation needs to be permanently established and perpetually funded to focus on criminal investigation into bush arson/pyroterrorism with a mandate to recommend deterrent policies and practices across Australian bushfire fighting as well as the media.

Media reporting leading up to the 7-Feb-09 firestorms, simply incited dormant serial arsonists. Go back and read The Age and television media in the days before and after 29 Jan when the first bush arsonist struck at Delburn (south wast of Churchill). The front page of The Age on Saturday 7-Feb-09 read: ’44 degree heat “as bad a day as you can imagine”
– which was a quote from of all people the Victorian Premier made to the general public the day prior.

Just like the media policy of not reporting suicides due it being known to encourage copy cats, so too media reporting of heatwaves and of extreme bushfire conditions needs to be tempered to avoid inciting dormant serial arsonists.

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This was a submission to the ABC TV Four Corners programme on the Victorian Bushfires ‘Two Days in Hell’ by reporter Quentin McDermott, ahead of it being aired Monday 16-Feb-09.

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Australia claims a noble record of wildlife conservation. These days we rely upon governments to perform their custodial duties to protect Australia’s vulnerable flora and fauna. But our Australian ground dwelling mammals continue to disappear. Is it because of government policy, neglect, under-resourcing, or condoning of habitat destruction?

The key problem is the lack of independent and unbiased biological and zoological measurement.

Year upon year, habitat encroachment through farming, mining, housing and prescribed burning our Australian ground dwelling habitat and its dependent mammalian species, continues to disappear. Recognised tests of habitat health iinclue the change in numbers of top order predators, the mix of biodiversity, and simply the observed presence of fauna, for instance when bushwalking.

Australia’s city-based environmental conservation movement lobbies from time to time, but seriously, if Australia’s species are to be saved from extinction, ignoring the spin from government agencies that man-made bushfire, farming, roads, mining, housing development is ‘sustainable’, billions invested in wildlife sanctaries will avert Australia’s world leading extinction record.

The extinction risk to Australia’s endemic species (rare, threatened, endangered) is that no government department is internationally legally accountable for monitoring the health of the species nor guaranteeing its survival.

Australia’s natural habitat risks decline in a comparable way to that of the Sumatran and Borneo rainforest habitat of the orang-utan.