Lynda loved Nature

Lynda Jacqueline lived by herself

In a small flat with a small garden bed

No electricity

Lynda was never poor wearing her straw trilby

Lynda’s tradition was young, young gorgeous young men

Who would steal a kiss

Lynda took life’s chances

Lynda would smile a sad smile

Lynda planted a sampling in her garden bed

Her peace with Nature

But Housing Commission killed it

Lynda was saddened

Lynda tried for wonderful tomorrows

This winter Lynda took a cold bath and never woke up.

 

 

This is a dedication to Lynda Jacqueline of Katoomba who passed away Friday 18th August 2017, aged 50.

The entire Sydney basin is currently blanketed by thick smoke haze as this photo by Nick Moir in the Sydney Morning Herald today shows.   The source of the smoke is trees burning in native bushland south and west of Sydney, this time specifically in at Ripple Creek near Warragamba Dam and the Bargo State Conservation Area south of Picton.

“Bargo State Conservation Area is a great place in NSW Southern Highlands for birdwatching, hiking, and swimming at Little River or Moore Creek.”

But not at this moment, it has been burned out.

The government-tasked arsonists call it “hazard reduction”, because they see native forest only as a hazard.    So in the off season, that is outside the “bushfire season, government arsonists set fire to forest habitat to justify their existence.  They choose a time when the weather is calm and there is a cold air inversion layer so that the smoke is trapped at ground level and lingers around longer.

This year, because there hasn’t been much rain over winter, the Rural Fire Starters (RFS) and their Victorian counterparts the Country Fire Arsonists (CFA) plan to commence their Bushfire Season early.

Proudly on its Facebook page the RFS boats “almost 100 hazard reduction burns are scheduled to take place in the coming week, weather permitting.”

Why?  

“Hazard reduction burns are part of a planned bush fire fuel reduction designed to protect life and property from intense wildfires. These are important controlled burns which will reduce the risk to people and properties from bush fires.”   And to back up their rationale, the RFS calls on Professor Ross Bradstock of the University of Wollongong to support them.   Not surprisingly, Professor Bradstock believes warm temperatures and low rainfall indicate the state should brace for a “significant” bushfire season.

Professor Ross Bradstock’s self-appointed Centre for Environmental Risk Management of Bushfires at the university gets funded out of the RFS annual budget.  Why would he not wish to encourage a fully engaged RFS in the off season and on season?

Such wanton destruction of remnant wildlife habitat doesn’t stop the annual bushfire destruction during the ‘on season’.  It’s just that the naming is different – “hazard reduction” becomes “bushfire”.  In fact most wildfires are caused either by  escaped hazard reductions or over enthusiastic head burning to counter a wildfire front , but the head burn then becomes the wildfire.  Most RFS trucks use petrol to start fires than water to put fire out.  The cultural motto is ‘Burn it before it burns, it’s only bush’.  It is a culture of bush arson.

A full list of planned bush arson was posted on the RFS website covering the state of New South Wales (this list is reproduced at end of this article).

Is it no wonder that Australia leads the world in wildlife extinctions and threatened species? 

Bushfire is a threatening process, more so when it is widespread which is what hazard reduction sets out to achieve.   A threat may be listed as a key threatening process under the NSW Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995 if it adversely affects threatened species, populations or ecological communities, or could cause species, populations or ecological communities to become threatened.  Fire kills wildlife.

Yet there is no independent ecological assessment of target burns, no thought given to ecologically threatened populations of flora and fauna, or to threatened ecological communities, to critical habitats or to endemic species.

In the entire state of New South Wales, the only locations officially declared “critical habitats” are that of Gould’s Petrel out in the distant Tasman Sea, the Little penguin population in in a secluded cove in Sydney’s North Harbour, Mitchell’s Rainforest Snail on tiny Stotts Island Nature Reserve in the Tweed River, and a remote grove of Wollemi Pines in the Blue Mountains, with no current draft recommendations being considered.

In the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, with the direction of the custodian, the National Parks and Wildlife Service, over the weekend arson crews set deliberately fire “West of Warragamba Dam” inside the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area.  This area is called Kanangra Boyd National Park, an iconic wilderness gem within the World Heritage estate, was deliberately incinerated by the very government authority charged with its care and protection.

We know the real reason why this vast wilderness region was listed as the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Are on 29 November 2000 – a drinking water catchment for an ever growing Sydney.

Kanangra Boyd National Park on a clear day

© Photo by Chris Rouen, ^https://isolateyourself.wordpress.com/tag/kanangra-boyd-national-park/

 

And so yesterday and today the thick smoke from the burnt forests has descended over Sydney.  That strong smoky smell has everyone breathing in dead habitat.

Air quality in parts of Sydney have hit dangerous levels with health alerts for people with lung conditions and asthma.

And it’s as if no-one cares about pollution any more.

 

Toxicology of Smoke Inhalation

 

Wood smoke is harmful when breathed in and prolonged exposure can be carcinogenic.  The airborne smoke particles vary in size from PM₁₀ to PM₂₅, which is a fine particulate matter each with a diameter between 1.0 and 2.5 micrometers, which is between 1% and 3% the diameter of a human hair.  It means that wood smoke can be suspended in air and easily inhaled. 

Wood Smoke emissions typically comprise the poisons carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, sulphur dioxide, ozone, methane, dioxin, aldehydes (such as formaldehyde), particulate organic carbon, benzene, toluene, styrene, acid gases, napthalene, mould spores, ash particulate, volatile organic compounds and polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), amongst others. 

These are all a toxic cocktail to humans and animals alike.   Fine particles in the air are able to travel deep into the respiratory tract and cause shortness of breath or worsen pre-existing medical conditions such as asthma. Woodsmoke exposure can depress the immune system and damage the layer of cells in the lungs that protect and cleanse the airways.

People who are exercising or doing an activity that causes them to breathe more rapidly and deeply are at a higher risk for health issues – including the volunteer firefighters sent in to do the damage.   The long term health consequences can be serious and latent.  Children, elderly people, others with pre-existing health conditions such as asthma, chronic bronchitis, and emphysema are also at a higher risk since they are more susceptible to the harmful effects of smoke inhalation. Long term exposure to air with particles has been associated with increases in risks for cancer, lung disease, and cardiovascular disease. Short term exposure typically only causes throat, eyes and nose irritation.

Carbon monoxide present in wood smoke can cause throbbing headaches, nausea and confusion.   Twenty minutes of active burning may be required to develop sufficient concentrations of CO to reach lethal levels.  But once exposed, 40 percent of those with severe poisonings will have long-term neurological impairment, including cognitive (emotional/behavior) dysfunction, short-term memory effects, and sensory motor (vision) problems.

Mix wood smoke in with exhaust fumes from traffic and industry and the dense smog can be lethal with prolonged exposure, such as currently in Sydney.

Wood smoke exposure’s long-term effects are less clear, and scientists say more study is needed.   Firefighters are susceptible to “camp crud,” colds and viruses that attack immune systems.  Wildfire-smoke exposure to mice has been linked to aggressive drops in blood pressure and may cause hardening of the arteries and development of plaque in the arteries.

Firefighters can wear devices called dosimeters that detect high levels of carbon monoxide.  Compare the safety kit the professionals receive to what the cheap volunteers have to put up with.

Wood heaters have been phased out because of the polluting adverse health effects of wood smoke.  But hazard reduction is wood smoke on steroids; government sanctioned.   Are they trying to kills us?

The RFS and CFA pompously dismiss public smoke inhalation concerns saying “consult your asthma action plan”.  It’s the same cop out as them saying “trigger your bushfire survival plan.”  They seem to presume this relinquishes government’s responsibility another notch.  The first notch being government hiding behind volunteers, thinking by doing so somehow provides government with impunity from its emergency performance accountability and public criticism.  Image if that attitude was used in the real professional emergency services like police and ambulance.   Would we be told “trigger your home defence”, “take the law into your own hands”, and “trigger your first aid kit”? 

Air Quality Index of Sydney today

Source: Beijing based group, Air Quality Index China, ^http://aqicn.org/city/sydney/

 

The following Air Quality Index chart for Bargo shows the heightened air pollution on Monday 14th August 2017, caused predominantly by the government’s hazard reduction activities.  Note the pollutants shown being O₃ (ground level ozone), NO₂ (nitrogen dioxide), SO₂ (sulfur dioxide), and CO (carbon monoxide).

Where are those concerned about greenhouse gas emissions?

There seems to be this culturally higher ideal of mitigating bushfire risk which entails burning forest habitat in case it burns.

 

 

Further Reading:

.

[1]  Wood Smoke Tables and Constituents, ^http://burningissues.org/car-www/science/table2.htm

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[2]  Hazard Reductions, Rural Fire Service of New South Wales, ^http://www.rfs.nsw.gov.au/fire-information/hazard-reductions

..

[3]  ‘Toxicology of Smoke Inhalation‘,  20090801, by Gill Hall, Fire Engineering, America, ^http://www.fireengineering.com/articles/print/volume-162/issue-8/features/toxicology-of-smoke-inhalation.html

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[4]  ‘Smoke and Ash Inhalation Related to Wildfires‘, 2012, by Kyla Young,  Geology and Human Health course in the Department of Earth Sciences, Montana State University, ^https://serc.carleton.edu/NAGTWorkshops/health/case_studies/smoke_ash.html

.

[5]  ‘Effects of long-term smoke exposure on firefighters unclear‘, 20150905, The Seattle Times, America, ^http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/northwest/effects-of-longterm-smoke-exposure-on-firefighters-unclear/

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[6]  ‘Avoid wood smoke‘, Government of Canada, ^https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/air-quality/indoor-air-contaminants/avoid-wood-smoke.html

Snuggle up to your stolen forest fire this winter

“…excellent quality, excellent service. We only source premium sustainable hardwood firewood (Ironbark and Box).”

Yeah sure you do, because it’s stolen from native forests when nobody’s watching.

Which forest for the restaurant industry?  RFS Hazard Reduction for Firewood profiteering?

 

No permit. No certification.  Any claim of sustainable is just lying advertising.

Legitimate Red Ironbark timber flooring retails for $100 per lineal metre.  So if you’re buying ironbark firewood off the back of a truck $140 a cubic metre, it is surely illegally taken from native forests.  Ever wonder why the ex-crim looking delivery driver only takes cash?

Firewood supplied across Australia is a cash black market run by criminal types.  It’s a winter scam.

 

If the firewood is not certified as plantation timber with an Australian Standard AS4708, then the firewood is likely stolen, which means you are in receipt of stolen goods.

And beware of this label photocopied in black and white

 

So snug up to an ironbark wood fire this winter and know you are part of the deforestation problem driving threatened woodland species into extincting. 

Your grand kids will ask why you were so selfish, when they see there’s none left – just like trying to buy Turpentine flooring these days.

Box Ironbark forest in central Victoria dominated by Red Ironbark (Eucalyptus tricarpa)

© Ian Lunt, ^https://ianluntecology.com/2012/01/20/fire-and-rain-2-water-for-ironbarks/

 

Criminal Loggers Caught

 

Pizzas sponsored by RFS commercial Hazard Reduction on the side?

 

Elphinstone Plateau from the north

© c.1991 Wyn Jones (biologist, NPWS)

Elphinstone Plateau is magnificently wild, forming an outstanding undeveloped peninsula-plateau jutting out into the Megalong.  It has long been a favourite wilderness destination for bushwalkers and rock climbers alike.

This predominantly natural and undisturbed plateau is mistakenly also referred to as ‘radiata plateau‘ due to a small invasive private pine plantation from the 1970s covering less that 5% of the plateau along an access track .  The plantation failed and the owner went broke.

Yet little known Elphinstone Plateau remains special home to rare and threatened regionally native species, culturally significant to local Aboriginal peoples and a magnet for the local outdoor community.

Sitting on the southern escarpment, Elphinstone Plateau, just west of Katoomba, towers high above rolling valleys has outstanding topography.  It remains the last remaining undeveloped peninsula-plateau in the upper Blue Mountains.   The Plateau has significant biodiversity, including vegetation communities such Blue Mountain Swamps, Eucalyptus Oreades Open Forest and Blue Mountains Heath.   It is also home to many endangered species including the Flame Robin, Glossy Black Cockatoo, Gang-Gang Cockatoo and the Varied Sittella as well as the Tiger Quoll, frequently sighted by locals.  Threatened plants include one of only ten places on the planet where the Dwarf (Blue) Mountain Pine (Pherosphaera fitzgeraldii) is endemic on the planet to the immediate upper Central Blue Mountains with its distribution fragmented to a few south-facing hanging swamp cliff faces on the Blue Mountains western escarpment at Elphinstone above Nellies Glen and nearby around Wentworth Falls above the Jamison Valley.

The IUCN reports that this taxon is endangered. It faces a very high risk of extinction in the wild in the near future due to a small population size and severe population fragmentation, with no sub-population estimated to contain more than 250 mature individuals.

The Dwarf Mountain Pine endemic on the planet to wet rocks within the spray of waterfalls of Elphinstone and Wentworth Falls

(Harden 1990, Hill 1998)

Steven, one of our local conservationists says that this wild plateau has significant biodiversity – Blue Mountain Swamps, rare Eucalyptus oreades Open Forest and many endangered species including the Flame Robin, Glossy Black Cockatoo, Gang-Gang Cockatoo, and the almost unknown Tiger Quoll.  

 

One of our local conservationists at Megalong Head on Elphinstone Plateau

Steven says that the plateau and its immediate surrounds provide are the only locality on the planet to naturally support the critically endangered Dwarf Mountain Pine and the little-known yellow flowering shrub Elphinstone Boronia (Leionema lachnaeoides).  Both are threatened with extinction and their survival depends on the area remaining undisturbed.

 
Threatened species Elphinstone Boronia  (Leionema lachnaeoides)

Endemic to Elphinstone Plateau (that means it grows natively nowhere else on the planet)

© Waratah Software
 

 

Survival depends on the area remaining undisturbed. 

Steven says local resident Glenn Humphreys has been involved with trying to protect and save Mount Elphinstone from housing development on and off for more than 25 years, successfully halting all sorts of elaborate development proposals.  

But now this wild and unique haven is at risk.   An integrated part of the Blue Mountains western escarpment has come under threat of land use development again – Mount Elphinstone (also mistakenly called Radiata Plateau) situated a few kilometres west of Katoomba.   Apart from a small area of Crown Land the majority of the Plateau is privately owned by a group that have repeatedly lodged development applications since the 1990s.  

 

Elphinstone Namesake

 

Mount Elphinstone, being the highest rise on the plateau is believed named after Major General Sir Howard Craufurd Elphinstone, VC, KCB, CMG (1829 – 1890) who was a British Army officer and a recipient of the Victoria Cross.

Born in Livonia (now Estonia), Elphinstone joined the British Corps of Royal Engineers as a gentleman cadet at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich and was commissioned as a second lieutenant in December 1847.  With the outbreak of the Crimean War, Elphinstone was posted to the Crimea.  

On 18 June 1855, he was 25 years old, and a lieutenant in the Royal Engineers, during the Siege of Sebastopol when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the Victoria Cross.VC.

His citation read:

“For fearless conduct, in having, on the night after the unsuccessful attack on the Redan, volunteered to command a party of volunteers, who proceeded to search for and bring back the scaling ladders left behind after the repulse; and while successfully performing this task, of rescuing trophies from the Russians, Captain Elphinstone conducted a persevering search, close to the enemy, for wounded men, twenty of whom he rescued and brought back to the Trenches.”

With the end of the war he was decorated by both Napoleon III, Emperor of France being appointed as a Knight of the Legion of Honour.

 

Private Development Threats to the Plateau

 

A proposed private development threatens its future.  Currently, two of three development applications recently lodged have been refused, leaving one approved for two dwellings.  They pose an inappropriate development wedge to future residential exploitation of this still wild plateau.

Now is the time to prevent any building and move the Plateau in public ownership for protection.   This could be the public’s last chance to secure the future of this stunning area and have Elphinstone Plateau become part of the National Park estate.

Blue Mountains residents,  the local outdoor community, and the Blue Mountains Conservation Society are all firmly committed to seeking protection for the Plateau.  We were delighted with all the community support our campaign received at Winter Magic – with lots of cheers from the crowd during the parade and most importantly all the letters sent off to the Minister for the Environment.

We are seeking to have Elphinstone Plateau purchased by the New South Wales or Australian Commonwealth governments and be incorporated into the Blue Mountains World Heritage Area.

But the battle is not yet won.  The local Blue Mountains Conservation Society is championing an environmental campaign to oppose the land use development and to have the plateau incorporated into the adjacent Blue Mountains World Heritage Area.

The Society is inviting locals and those passionate about protecting this special place, to join in a rally on Sunday 30th July at 1.30pm at Cahill’s Lookout, Cliff Drive, Katoomba.

 

Further Reading:

.

[1]  Leave Radiata Plateau Wild Campaign,  ^http://www.bluemountains.org.au/leaveradiataplateauwild/

.

[2] Elphinstone (Radiata) Plateau – Bushwalk: Bottleneck Pass and The Devils Hole (29 June 2016) by Dave Noble (NPWS), ^http://www.david-noble.net/blog/?p=11300

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[3]  Dwarf Mountain Pine (Pherosphaera fitzgeraldi), The Gymnosperm Database, ^http://www.conifers.org/po/Pherosphaera_fitzgeraldi.php

.

[4]  Major General Sir Howard Craufurd Elphinstone, ^https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howard_Craufurd_Elphinstone

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Looks natural, but decades of cattle have toxified the riparian zone’s soil and flora co-biology

From 12th-14th May 2017, the New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service has planned to set fire to 9km2 of designated wildlife habitat in the Abercrombie River National Park south of the town of Oberon.  It’s about 150km west of the Sydney GPO as the crow flies.

NPWS Area Manager Kim de Govrik has contracted a helicopter to indiscriminately drop incendiaries into the remote and steep wilderness valleys and ridgelines around Silent Creek, west of Abercrombie Road.  It will blanket burn vast swathes of remnant forest within the national park.

“NPWS will use a helicopter and ground crews in the steep terrain in the south-east corner of the Park,” Mr de Govrik said.

Any wonder how Abercrombie’s Silent Creek got its name? 

Two generations ago, American marine biologist and author, Rachel Carson in 1962 launched her seminal book ‘Silent Spring’ telling how all life—from fish to birds to apple blossoms to human children—had been “silenced” by the insidious effects of DDT on Cape Code, Massachusetts. 

DDT stands for Dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane, a hazardous agricultural synthetic pesticide developed in the 1940s that also contaminated food crops and ecology and caused human cancer and Alzheimer disease.  Its use wasn’t banned until 2001.

Rachel Carson at Cape Cod in 1958

Source:  ‘The Story of Silent Spring’, by the Natural Resources Defense Council, ^https://www.nrdc.org/stories/story-silent-spring

Hazard Reduction policy is finishing the extinction job across New South Wales and Australia.  Originally termed ‘prescribed burning’, it too has been used since the 1940s originally by US foresters.  

A camp stay in Abercrombie River National Park will disturb any informed conservationist of how silent the birdlife is in the region.  No dawn chorus like in healthy forest habitats.  And try camping at Silent Creek after the hazard reduction. 

“People are advised that smoke from the burn may impact upon the local area and they should close their windows and bring their washing indoors. Those with asthma or people who are susceptible to respiratory problems should avoid the area or remain inside with windows and doors closed. Motorists are reminded to drive to the conditions, observe all warning signs and follow directions from fire crews,”  Mr de Govrik said.

It is another contribution by government to hazardous and unnecessary smoke, toxic air pollution, greenhouse gases, and human global warming that governments complain about.  Yet in contradiction, this burn is part of the NSW Government’s $76 million package of what it calls hazard reduction over six years.

  

 

Hazard Reduction Fallacy

To protect the scarce Australia’s remaining national parks, hazard reduction arson is run by state governments each in turn cut funding and otherwise set fire to the wildlife habitat, in case it burns.  In New South Wales, the misnamed National Parks and Wildlife Service brings in its petrol-laden trucks and with the the firie-eyed enthusiasm of the Rural Fire Service sets fire to these ‘national parks’ every time the bush has grown back.

‘Hazard reduction’ is spin for habitat reduction.  Habitat is deemed a hazard, and its forest a fuel risk.  It is a policy of perpetuating inadequate fire fighting funding to responsibly and quickly detect, respond to and put out bushfires, like their urban professional counterparts are tasked to do.    Instead, the cheap and ecologically destructive approach is to burn the habitagt in case it burns, so less to worry about.  It is self-defeating.  Like setting fire to ones home to stay warm in winter.  Read up on the demise of the Rapa Nui on Easter Island.

The government’s hazard reduction Managing fire-prone NSW national parks requires a three-pronged approach, including fire planning, community education, and fuel management. When it comes to fuel like dead wood, NPWS conducts planned hazard reduction activities like mowing and controlled burning to assist in the protection of life, property and community.

So the $76 million claims “to boost bushfire preparedness and double hazard reduction in the State’s national parks“.  Many such hazard reduction operations undertaken by NPWS across NSW each year, many with the assistance of the RFS, who relish the opportunity.  Yet when bushfires occur, the same slow response ensues and the same widespread destruction often results, with or without hazard reduction.  Ember attack in high winds travels kilometres beyond any hazard reduction ground.  

But the government arson cult is entrenched.  The lack of responsible funding is chronic.

No flora species has ever been made extinct because it has not been fire ravaged, yet how many species of fauna are on the edge of extinction because  they continue to be?

Anyone with respiratory problems or suffering from Asthma is urged to visit NSW Health or the Asthma Foundation.   Remnant native wildlife like the locally indigenous Black Pademelon, not so Common Wombat and Ringtail Possum, will just have to suck it up.  Each of these species is territorial  which means that they don’t relocate when fire devastates their home range.

What about the locally indigenous Echidnas, Eastern Grey Kangaroos, Emus, Platypus, Goannas, Eastern Water Dragons, Broad-headed Snakes, Wedge-Tail Eagles dependent the habitat and the more than sixty species of native birds?  

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Abercrombie a habitat island within a logged landscape

Abercrombie River National Park is situated surrounded by a logged landscape to the horizon.   The Park was gazetted in 1995 as part of a nature conservation strategy supposedly aimed at maintaining the state of New South Wales’ biodiversity.   It claims to protect an important part of remnant bushland within the south-western central tablelands.

By incinerating it?

Actually, the truth is that the region has been too steep for pastoralists to trash, so it was left.  Then the 19th Century gold prospectors got in and dig a lot of it up, before it was abandoned and surrounding farms let their pigs escape and go feral.  Sadly, Abercrombie has become a play zone for weekend hoons.

When did the Parks Service last do a wildlife survey in Abercrombie?    Back when the park was gazetted in 1995 when ecologist Christopher Togher wrote his Report on the Biodiversity and Land Management of the Abercrombie River Catchment.   

Booroolong Frog (Litoria booroolongensis). Locally indigenous to the Abercrombie River region, an endangered species

How many left in Silent Creek?

 

The ‘Parks Service’ thinks it knows best, and has atrophied to presume it exists to facilitate anthropocentric tourism and recreation.  So the tourism arm of the ‘Parks Service’ has set the region aside for exploitation for four wheel touring, fishing, camping, canoeing and bushwalking with two toilets.

The National Parks Service website hypocritically states: 

<<Abercrombie River National Park is a special place..This is an environment built for adventure. One of the most popular activities in the park is 4WD touring (and trail biking). Some of the trails running along gorges and ridges can be pretty challenging, even for the experienced driver. For those with plenty of energy, you can also explore these trails on mountain bikes..>> 

Near Bummaroo Ford Abercrombie River (hoon park), 19th May 2015

 

On the same page, Parks Services recognises that Abercrombie River National Park is a special place for nature and wildlife conservation.  Then it recommends people “get out into the national park and have an adventure!”  It’s all about the experience see.

Oberon Council, home of lumberjacks, claims it is:

<<surrounded by a number of national parks and is the perfect base to experience these enormous sanctuaries of pristine bushland and all they have to offer.  Our national parks are a haven for adventure seekers, with bushwalking, mountain biking, canyoning, camping, abseiling, rock climbing, fishing, 4WD touring and so much more.>>

But you have to drive through vast areas of clear felled forest and plantations around Oberon to get there.

There are four camping sites within the Abercrombie River National Park at Bummaroo Ford, The Sink, The Beach and Silent Creek – all overused.  

Feral pigs run riot throughout the region, happily destroying the riparian zones of the watercourses with impunity.   Over the decades, cattle and now feral pigs have dug up the riparian vegetation causing bank erosion.  They have toxified the soil biology causing weed infestation and facilitating the spread of flora diseases such as dieback – so destroying the region’s native ecosystem.  

Feral pigs thrive in the Australia bush and cause immense environmental damage especially to watercourses. 

[Source: ‘Pig damage , Cycas brunnea habitat, by Alastair Freeman, 2010, ^https://wetlandinfo.ehp.qld.gov.au/wetlands/ecology/components/species/?sus-scrofa]

In the 1960s there were about 50,000 pig farmers across Australia, and many escaped.  The Abercrombie River National Park has been left to become a haven for feral pigs.  Yet the Plan of Management states: “Within the Abercrombie catchment is an extensive amount of remnant riparian vegetation which is extremely important in maintaining water quality and habitat for threatened aquatic ecosystems.”  (Source:  ‘Abergrombie River National Park Plan of Management 2006, 2.2.2. Significance of Abercrombie River National Park, page 2).

<<Feral pigs are opportunistic scavengers and prey on invertebrates, bird eggs, small mammals, reptiles, amphibians and soil invertebrates. Their selective feeding habits also affect the biodiversity of vegetation and creates competition for food resources of native species.  Feral pigs have negative impacts on native ecological systems including changing species composition, disrupting species succession and by altering nutrient and water cycles. Impacts can be direct or indirect, acute or chronic, periodic or constant, and may be influenced by changing seasonal conditions.  Feral pigs tend to congregate around water as they are highly susceptible to heat. The impact of the pigs wallowing in wetlands and watercourses totally destroys these finely balanced ecosystems.  They also prey on ground dwelling mammals, reptiles and birds, in some cases putting extensive pressure on rare and endangered species.>>

Source: ^http://www.animalcontrol.com.au/pig.htm

Then there are the feral rabbits, feral goats, feral deer and feral recreational hoons.    The absence of park rangers is conspicuous.

How Australia treats its national parks

The ‘Parks Service’ website promotes “rivers and creek systems within the park provide habitat for trout cod and Macquarie Perch, which are totally protected species. River blackfish, silver perch and the Murray cray are also found which are regionally rare. Introduced trout may only be caught during the trout season from the October long weekend to the June long weekend.“

So it encourages people to fish protected species?

In Sunday 7th January 2014 (hot mid-summer), campers abandoned their camp fire without extinguishing it.  Their haphazard campsite, situated on Macks Flat near a pine plantation about 1km north of The Beach, was not approved   It burned around 50 hectares including within the Abercrombie River National Park.  It was not a designated camping site and the campers went unpunished.

The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service is legally responsible under the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act 1974 to to protect and conserve areas containing outstanding or representative ecosystems, natural or cultural features or landscapes or phenomena that provide opportunities for public appreciation and inspiration and sustainable visitor use.

<<Under the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Act national parks are managed to:

1. Conserve biodiversity, maintain ecosystem functions, protect geological and geomorphological features and natural phenomena and maintain natural landscapes;

2. Conserve places, objects, features and landscapes of cultural value;

3. Protect the ecological integrity of one or more ecosystems for present and future generations;

4. Promote public appreciation and understanding of the park’s natural and cultural values;

5. Provide for sustainable visitor use and enjoyment that is compatible with conservation of natural and cultural values;

6. Provide for sustainable use (including adaptive reuse) of any buildings or structures or modified natural areas having regard to conservation of natural and cultural values; and

7. Provide for appropriate research and monitoring.>>

 

This environmental law applies to Abercrombie River National Park.

Yet strategic under-funding, under-resourcing and under-staffing forces the service to neglect these core responsibilities.  Hoons run riot and the park is abused. What a disgrace!   The environmental law is weak because there are no standards, measures or breach penalties.  It was drafted to be a motherhood statement to appease malleable conservationists.

Since being gazetted in 1995, Abercrombie River National Park has been treated as a recreation park, not as a wildlife sanctuary in any way, except on paper to pretend the government actual has a conservation bone in its body.   It’s called ‘Greenwashing’.  NPWS works very closely with the Upper Lachlan Tourist Association, and the Rural Fire Service.

In 2010, National Parks and Wildlife staff carried out a 520 hectare hazard reduction burn in the north of Abercrombie River National Park, with the RFS in tow.  Kanangra Boyd area manager Kim de Govrik said at the time the burn off took place in the Felled Timber Creek area.

<<The park is now open and ready for the influx of eastern campers,” Mr de Govrik said. “The operation was a great success thanks to the assistance of the local RFS brigades. RFS volunteers from Jerrong/Paling Yards, Gurnang and Black Springs helped in putting in the 11km of fire edge.>>

During 2009, National Parks and Wildlife completed a record 230 burns, covering nearly 80,000 hectares of native habitat.

NPWS is targeting the state’s 225 national parks and reserves for programmatic habitat reduction under its current $76 million programme:

• Crowdy Bay National Park
• Sea Acres National Park
• Yuraygir National Park
• Mimosa Rocks National Park
• Jervis Bay National Park
• Nightcap National Park
• Hill End Historic Site
• Montague Island Nature Reserve
• Wombeyan Karst Conservation Reserve
• Worimi National Park
• Sturt National Park
• Dorrigo National Park
• Wyrrabalong National Park
• Yanga National Park
• Popran National Park
• Yellomundee Regional Park
• Blue Mountains National Park
• Dharawal National Park
• Blue Gum Hills Regional Park
• Warrumbungle National Park
• William Howe Regional Park
• Wollemi National Park
• Wolli Creek Regional Park
• Wollumbin National Park
• Nymboi-Binderay National Park
• Lane Cove National Park
• Ben Boyd National Park
• Tomaree National Park
• Coffs Coast Regional Park
• Murray Valley National Park
• Rouse Hill Regional Park
• Georges River National Park
• Cape Byron State Conservation Area
• Mutawintji National Park
• Glenrock State Conservation Area
• Royal National Park
• Myall Lakes National Park
• Oxley Wild Rivers National Park
• Eurobodalla National Park
• Gaagal Wanggaan (South Beach) National Park
• Brisbane Water National Park
• Morton National Park
• Gundabooka National Park
• Corramy Regional Park
• Mount Kaputar National Park
• Berowra Valley National Park
• Bongil Bongil National Park
• Kinchega National Park
• Dharug National Park
• Munmorah State Conservation Area
• Murramarang National Park
• Abercrombie Karst Conservation Reserve
• Abercrombie River National Park
• Muogamarra Nature Reserve
• Garigal National Park
• Mount Canobolas State Conservation Area
• Borenore Karst Conservation Reserve
• Bouddi National Park
• Kosciuszko National Park
• Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park
• Arakwal National Park
• Border Ranges National Park
• Pilliga National Park
• Mungo National Park
• Leacock Regional Park
• Paroo-Darling National Park
• Washpool National Park
• Hat Head National Park
• Cattai National Park
• New England National Park
• Heathcote National Park
• Budderoo National Park
• South East Forests National Park
• Bents Basin State Conservation Area
• Bundjalung National Park
• Barrington Tops National Park
• Jenolan Karst Conservation Reserve
• Arakoon National Park
• Sydney Harbour National Park
• Tyagarah Nature Reserve
• Cottan-Bimbang National Park
• Illawarra Escarpment State Conservation Area
• Boonoo Boonoo National Park
• Kattang Nature Reserve
• Yerranderie Regional Park
• Yuranighs Aboriginal Grave Historic Site
• Turon National Park
• Hunter Wetlands National Park
• Towra Point Nature Reserve
• Woomargama National Park
• Biamanga National Park
• Culgoa National Park
• Cudgen Nature Reserve
• Cullendulla Creek Nature Reserve
• Dooragan National Park
• Yarriabini National Park
• Coorabakh National Park
• Wallingat National Park
• Wallumatta Nature Reserve
• Mann River Nature Reserve
• Queens Lake Nature Reserve
• Yanununbeyan State Conservation Area
• Deua National Park
• Yengo National Park
• Kings Plains National Park
• Koreelah National Park
• Willandra National Park
• Willi Willi National Park
• Wingham Brush Nature Reserve
• Woko National Park
• Kwiambal National Park
• Lake Macquarie State Conservation Area
• Jilliby State Conservation Area
• Murramarang Aboriginal Area
• Wadbilliga National Park
• Wallarah National Park
• Terry Hie Hie Aboriginal Area
• Lake Innes Nature Reserve
• Cambewarra Range Nature Reserve
• Cecil Hoskins Nature Reserve
• Chaelundi National Park
• Kanangra-Boyd National Park
• Karuah National Park
• Parr State Conservation Area
• Dunggir National Park
• Brimbin Nature Reserve
• Brindabella National Park
• Murrumbidgee Valley National Park
• Cocoparra National Park
• Robertson Nature Reserve
• Livingstone National Park
• Gibraltar Range National Park
• Burragorang State Conservation Area
• Dalrymple-Hay Nature Reserve
• Deriah Aboriginal Area
• Capertee National Park
• Coramba Nature Reserve
• Goobang National Park
• Tapin Tops National Park
• Goolawah National Park
• Clyde River National Park
• Monga National Park
• Mount Imlay National Park
• Bindarri National Park
• Muttonbird Island Nature Reserve
• Seven Mile Beach National Park
• Tweed Heads Historic Site
• Palm Grove Nature Reserve
• Goulburn River National Park
• Nangar National Park
• Ulidarra National Park
• Toonumbar National Park
• Weddin Mountains National Park
• Werakata National Park
• Broadwater National Park
• Carrai National Park
• Cascade National Park
• Mummel Gulf National Park
• Munghorn Gap Nature Reserve
• Dthinna Dthinnawan National Park
• Bungonia National Park
• Tallaganda National Park
• Torrington State Conservation Area
• Guy Fawkes River National Park
• Nadgee Nature Reserve
• Bournda National Park
• The Rock Nature Reserve – Kengal Aboriginal Place
• Bomaderry Creek Regional Park
• Oolambeyan National Park
• Sherwood Nature Reserve
• Warrabah National Park
• Towarri National Park
• Richmond Range National Park
• Gardens of Stone National Park
• Macquarie Nature Reserve
• Scheyville National Park
• Mount Grenfell Historic Site
• Macquarie Pass National Park
• Victoria Park Nature Reserve
• Ngambaa Nature Reserve
• Jerrawangala National Park
• Nowendoc National Park
• Seaham Swamp Nature Reserve
• Brunswick Heads Nature Reserve
• Broken Head Nature Reserve
• Nattai National Park
• Bald Rock National Park
• Marramarra National Park
• Meroo National Park
• Moonee Beach Nature Reserve
• Mebbin National Park
• Budawang National Park
• Conimbla National Park
• Thirlmere Lakes National Park
• Copeland Tops State Conservation Area
• Boorganna Nature Reserve
• Werrikimbe National Park
• Whian Whian State Conservation Area
• Bangadilly National Park
• Bargo State Conservation Area
• Nymboida National Park
• Conjola National Park
• Coolah Tops National Park
• Mount Royal National Park
• Garawarra State Conservation Area
• Middle Brother National Park
• Limeburners Creek National Park
• Little Llangothlin Nature Reserve
• Barren Grounds Nature Reserve
• Booti Booti National Park
• Moore Park Nature Reserve
• Iluka Nature Reserve
• Watagans National Park
• Hartley Historic Site
• Mount Hyland Nature Reserve
• Cathedral Rock National Park
• Saltwater National Park
• Narrawallee Creek Nature Reserve
• Tooloom National Park
• Mother of Ducks Lagoon Nature Reserve
• Beni State Conservation Area
• Burning Mountain Nature Reserve
• Mullion Range State Conservation Area
• La Perouse area
• Kurnell area

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Further Reading:

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[1]  Hazard Reduction Programme, NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service,  ^http://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/conservation-programs/hazard-reduction-program

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[2]   ‘National Parks Experiences‘, by Oberon Council, ^http://www.oberonaustralia.com.au/visitor-information/national-parks/

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[3]   Booroolong Frog  (Litoria booroolongensis) ,  Australian Government Department of Environment and (contradictory) Energy, ^http://www.environment.gov.au/cgi-bin/sprat/public/publicspecies.pl?taxon_id=1844

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[4]  Abercrombie River National Park, by NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service, ^http://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/visit-a-park/parks/abercrombie-river-national-park/learn-more

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[5]  Abercrombie River National Park, by Upper Lachlan Tourism, ^http://visitupperlachlan.com.au/abercrombierivernp.html

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[6]     ‘The Story of Silent Spring – How a courageous woman took on the chemical industry and raised important questions about humankind’s impact on nature‘, by the Natural Resources Defense Council, ^https://www.nrdc.org/stories/story-silent-spring

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[7]    ‘A Report on the Biodiversity and Land Management of the Abercrombie River Catchment‘, 1996, by Christopher Togher, National Parks Association of N.S.W., ^http://trove.nla.gov.au/work/16032156?selectedversion=NBD12849978

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A brief insight into ‘The Friends of Katoomba Falls Creek Valley Inc.’ and their efforts to protect a special place.

“Gain a short, little known insight into a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens who came together led by the late Neil Stuart to become guardians of a very special natural valley in the Upper Blue Mountains.  Learn about the wealth of stories, how over 26 years locals cared for the valley’s integrity, how volunteers committed to half a lifetime of unpaid bushcare, made and sold jam at street stalls to raise funds, and fought a council Goliath.  Be shocked by the truth of what really happened in 1957 and the lifetime trauma to what was once an harmonious yet socially marginalised community subsisting on Katoomba’s fringe.

This is of living contemporary social history.  This is a controversial expose into one group’s community volunteerism, activism, environmentalism and nimbyism and social justice – thousands of hours given up to save ‘Katoomba Falls Creek Valley’, known by some as ‘The Gully’, known by others as ‘Catalina Raceway’.

This is very much an Australian story, a microcosm of Australian history and pre-history – one locally as rich as it is beautiful yet very sad.  It has impacted upon dozens of locals, old families and their ancestors. It is a story about respecting the natural, anthropological and community values of one valley.  Recent history became complex, protracted and nasty – involving displacement, forced eviction, invasion, desecration, secret deals, politics, animosities, divide-and-conquer manipulation, empty political promises, conflicting interests, threats and designs by influential millions, the various meetings, many plans of development (some silly), token consultation, one of metaphorically trying to herd cats and twenty six years of community emotional snakes and ladders.

Katoomba Falls

This presentation was delivered by a former member of ‘The Friends’ yesterday at Hobby Reach, Wentworth Falls, the home of the Blue Mountains Historical Society Inc.

For those who attended and requested the reading of the poem…

Soliloquy of a Scribbly Gum

Ancient Balga, grass tree, xanthorroea in Dwellingup forest, South West Western Australia.  Photo by Jenreflect, 20121104.

If we can respectfully wise up and change from calling ‘Ayres Rock’ after an English mining magnate turned politician to ‘Ayers Rock/Uluru’ in 1993, then to ‘Uluru/Ayers Rock’ in 2002, then we can just drop Henry Ayres from the Rock’s association altogether.  Henry Ayres was a 19th Century copper mining robber baron who devastated the landscape of Burra in South Australia.  A statue in Adelaide near parliament may be appropriate.

Likewise, if we can respectfully wisen up and change from calling this grass tree a ‘black boy’ to calling it a ‘xanthorroea’ then we can call it its traditional name ‘balga’.

“We never catch marron when the creek didn’t run, or the river didn’t run. Always catch marron when the water runs. That’s our culture. You gotta give ’em a chance to breed.  

And if you got anything with eggs on ’em, you threw ’em back….We never had nets, yeah, we coulda made nets but we didn’t believe that, you know, you rape the country. So you gotta leave some for the breeding.”

– Partick Hume, 2008, oral history , Kaartdijin Noongar, South West Aboriginal Land and Sea Council, Western Australia.

 

‘Aboriginal people, not environmentalists, are our best bet for protecting the planet’

by David Suzuki, published in The Vancouver Sun, 20150608, ^http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/David+Suzuki+Aboriginal+people+environmentalists+best+protecting+planet/11112668/story.html  (contributed by our supporters Barbara and Stan).

<<… Using DNA to track the movement of people in the past, scientists suggest our species evolved some 150,000 years ago on the plains of Africa.  That was our habitat, but unlike most other animals, we were creative and used our brains to find ways to exploit our surroundings. We were far less impressive in numbers, size, speed, strength or sensory abilities than many others sharing our territory, but it was our brains that compensated.

Over time, our numbers increased and we moved in search of more and new resources (and probably to check out the Neanderthals with whom we crossbred before they went extinct). When we moved into new territories, we were an alien creature, just like the introduced ones that trouble us today.

George Monbiot of The Guardian makes the point that we can trace the movement of our species by a wave of extinction of the big, slow-moving, dim-witted creatures that we could outwit with even the simplest of implements like clubs, pits, and spears.

Our brains were our great evolutionary advantage, conferring massive memory, curiosity, inventiveness and observational powers.

I can’t emphasize that enough.

Our brains gave us a huge advantage and it did something I think is unique — it created a concept of a future, which meant we realized we could affect that future by our actions in the present. By applying our acquired knowledge and insights, we could deliberately choose a path to avoid danger or trouble, and to exploit opportunities. I believe foresight was a huge evolutionary advantage for our species. And that’s what is so tragic today when we have all the amplified foresight of scientists and supercomputers, which have been warning us for decades that we are heading down a dangerous path, but now we allow politics and economics to override this predictive power.

No doubt after we evolved, we quickly eliminated or reduced the numbers of animals and plants for which we found uses. We had no instinctive behavioural traits to restrict or guide our actions — we learned by the consequences of what we did. And all the mistakes that we made and successes that we celebrated were important lessons in the body of accumulating knowledge of a people in a territory.

That was very powerful and critical to understanding our evolutionary success – it was painstakingly acquired experience that became a part of the culture. We are an invasive species all around the world, and I find it amazing that our brains enabled us to move into vastly different ecosystems ranging from steaming jungles to deserts, mountains to arctic tundra, and to flourish on the basis of the painful accumulation of knowledge through trial and error, mistakes, etc.

So it was the people who stayed in place as others moved on, who had to learn to live within their means, or they died. That is what I believe is the basis of indigenous knowledge that has built up over millennia and that will never be duplicated by science because it is acquired from a profoundly different basis (I wrote about the differences in a book, Wisdom of the Elders). The wave of exploration hundreds of years ago brought a very different world view to new lands — North and South America, Africa, Australia — based on a search for opportunity, resources, wealth. There was no respect for flora and fauna except as potential for riches, and certainly no respect for the indigenous people and their cultures. Of course, by outlawing language and culture of indigenous peoples, dominant colonizers attempt to stamp out the cultures which are such impediments to exploitation of the land. Tom King’s book, The Inconvenient Indian, argues very persuasively that policies are to “get those Indians off the land”.

“There was no respect for flora and fauna except as potential for riches, and certainly no respect for the indigenous people and their cultures.”

 

I think of my grandparents as part of the wave of exploration of the past centuries.  They arrived in Canada from Japan between 1902 and 1904. When they came on a harrowing steamship trip, there were no telephones to Japan, no TV, radio, cellphones or computers.  They never learned English. They came on a one-way trip to Canada for the promise of opportunity.  Their children, my parents, grew up like all the other Japanese-Canadian kids at that time, with no grandparents and no elders. In other words, they had no roots in Japan or Canada. To them, land was opportunity. Work hard, fish, log, farm, mine, use the land to make money. And I believe that is the dominant ethic today and totally at odds with indigenous perspectives.

Remember when battles were fought over drilling in Hecate Strait, supertankers down the coast from Alaska, the dam at Site C, drilling for oil in ANWR, the dam to be built at Altamire in Brazil?

I was involved in small and big ways in these battles, which we thought we won 30 to 35 years ago.  But as you know, they are back on the agenda today. So our victories were illusions because we didn’t change the perspective through which we saw the issues.

“Our victories were illusions because we didn’t change the perspective through which we saw the issues.”

 

That’s what I say environmentalists have failed to do, to use the battles to get people to change their perspectives, and that’s why I have chosen to work with First Nations because in most cases, they are fighting through the value lenses of their culture.

The challenge is to gain a perspective on our place in nature. That’s why I have made one last push to get a ball rolling on the initiative to enshrine the right to a healthy environment in our constitution. It’s a big goal, but in discussing the very idea, we have to ask, what do we mean by a healthy environment. We immediately come to the realization that the most important factor that every human being needs to live and flourish is a breath of air, a drink of water, food and the energy from photosynthesis. Without those elements, we die.

So our healthy future depends on protecting those fundamental needs, which amazingly enough, are cleansed, replenished and created by the web of life itself. So long as we continue to let the economy and political priorities shape the discussion, we will fail in our efforts to find a sustainable future. I have been trying to tell business folk and politicians that, in the battle over the Northern Gateway, what First Nations are trying to tell us is that their opposition is because there are things more important than money.>>

Things more important than Money

Noongar people are the Aboriginal traditional owners of the south-west of Western Australia and have been for over 45,000 years.

<<Noongar boodja (country) extends from north of Jurien Bay, inland to north of Moora and down to the southern coast between Bremer Bay and east of Esperance. It is defined by 14 different areas with varied geography and 14 dialectal groups.

We have a deep knowledge and respect for our country, which has been passed down by our Elders.

Noongar people have a profound physical and spiritual connection to country. It relates to our beliefs and customs regarding creation, life and death, and spirits of the earth. Spiritual connection to country guides the way we understand, navigate and use the land. It also influences our cultural practices.

For thousands of years Noongar people have resided on and had cultural connection to the booja – land. Everything in our vast landscape has meaning and purpose. We speak our own language and have our own lore and customs. The lore is characterised by a strong spiritual connection to country. This means caring for the natural environment and for places of significance. Our lore relates to ceremonies, and to rituals for hunting and gathering when food is abundant and in season. Connection to booja is passed on through our stories, art, song and dance. Noongar people not only survived European colonisation but we thrived as family groups and sought to assert our rights to our booja. For Noongar people, the south-west of Western Australia is ngulla booja – our country.

Noongar lore and custom guide the ways in which we define our country and our rights to it. Lore influences how we connect with and care for the land. As Noongar people we have a duty to speak for our country, to acknowledge its value to our communities and to observe lore that governs who may or may not ‘speak for country’.

Noongar people have always used our knowledge of the six seasons in the south-west of Western Australia to hunt, fish, and gather only the most ripe and abundant food sources for our needs.

The rituals and ceremonies performed by Noongar people over many thousands of years reflect our sustainable use of the environment and reinforce our connection to country. These rituals include domestic and social customs that observe Noongar lore governing the use of land and resources. An important and significant part of Noongar culture is the teaching of sustainable environmental practices, handed down by our Elders.

Being Noongar is to be part of a family and community, which determines our relationship to country. The relationship to country empowers our identity as a Noongar person.>>

Source:  ^https://www.noongarculture.org.au/connection-to-country/

Concept of Country 

Source: Teaching the Indigenous Concepts of Country and Sustainability (2010), by The Australian Research Institute for Environment and Sustainability (ARIES), ^http://aries.mq.edu.au/projects/deewr_indigenous_concepts/

“We come here to this place here, Minningup, the Collie River, to share the story of this area or what makes it so special. It is the resting place of the Ngangungudditj walgu, the hairy faced snake. Baalap ngany noyt is our spirit and this is where he rests. You have big bearded full moon at night time you can see him, his spirit there, his beard resting in the water. And we come to this place here today to show respect to him plus also to meet our people because when they pass away this is where we come to talk to them. Not to the cemetery where they are buried but here because their spirits are in this water. This is where all our spirits will end up here. Karla koorliny we call it. Coming home. Ngany kurt, ngany karla – our heart, our home. This, our Beeliargu, is the river people. So that’s why we always come to this Minningup. It’s very important.

This is the important part of the river, of the whole Collie River and the Preston River and the Brunswick River, because he created all them rivers and all the waters but here is the most important because this is where he rest. So whenever we come back now – my cousin died the other day so we come back here, bring his spirit home because this is where he belong here. They will bury him with his mother and you sing out to him. Ngany moort koorliny. Ngany waanginy, dadjinin waanginy kaartdijin djurip. And we come and look there and talk to you old fellow. Your people have come back. Ngany waangkaniny. I talk now. Balap kaartdijin. Listen, listen. Palanni waangkaniny. Ngany moort koorliny noonook. Ngany moort wanjanin. Your people come to rest with you now. Listen old fellow, listen for ’em, bring them home. Karla koorliny. Bring them home and then you sing to them. (Singing in language) And then chuck sand to land in the water so he can smell you. That’s our rules. Beeliargu moort. That’s the river people. That’s why this place important.”

– Joe Northover talks about Minningup Pool on the Collie River, ^https://www.noongarculture.org.au/connection-to-country/

Me, me, me anthropocentrism is so robber baron babyboomer. Learn about ecocentrism.    Caring For Country starts with respect and perhaps respecting that 45,000 years of connection has shown that there are six seasons in Noongar – Birak, Bunuru, Djeran, Makuru, Djilba, Kambarang. (Ed.)

Thomson River from Walhalla Road Bridge, Victoria, Australia.

(Photo by editor 20170322 looking north)

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Walhalla Mizzle

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It’s been raining gentle all night

In crisp mountain air

I sit on my dawn porch

I gaze through the grey mizzle

To the thick treed ridge

Covering the steep spur

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Across Stringers Creek

The creek babbles far below

Feeding the mighty Thomson

Low heavy cloud envelops

Robins, larks, parrots, finches, firetails, martins or currawongs

Greet the daylight

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Walhalla’s quiet now

As it should be up here

In the wild ranges steep

The 50 year army of gold reefers

Has long been and gone

Shafters taken their bargains and fortunes

Till the ground lay barren, the hills denuded, the Thomson damned

The batteries, the boilers and engines and waterwheel are gone

The miners, drinkers, shop keepers, the shafted

The school kids who played in bad soil

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The long tunnels lie empty and dank

The dark shafts abandoned to victim ghosts

The slag heap lies as a mountainous waste

Still laced with arsenic

Stringers choked by discarded tailings

They all went back up over Little Joe, the twenty-five hundred

Back to their big smoke

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The rail remains as industrious memory

To the heyday of industry and hardship

Fifteen tons of gold taken

On the marble column count

Dividends paid out

Two fires, a flood, disease and arsenic

Dozens perished for the gold fever

As the slain to Odin

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The mizzle is pure till it touches the ground

Surrounding forest seems back

The creek tries flow as it did, crystal but dead

A heritage cancer cluster

A new breed of shafters.

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Stringers Creek, from Main Road, Walhalla

(Photo by editor 20170322)

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Further Reading:

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[1]    “Elevated arsenic values can be detected up to 15 metres from the mineralised zone” –  in ‘Nature of gold mineralisation in the Walhalla Goldfield, eastern Victoria, Australia‘, 2007, by Megan A. Hough, Laurent Ailleres (School of Geosciences, Monash University), Frank P. Bierlein (Centre for Exploration Targeting, University of Western Australia, Adele Seymon (Geoscience Victoria) and Stuart Hutchin (Goldstar Resources, Rawson),
^https://www.smedg.org.au/HoughOct07.html

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[2]    ‘Approaching a century-old legacy of arsenic and mercury contamination’, 2016, by Dr. Linda Campbell, Senior Research Fellow at Environmental Science, Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, ^http://ap.smu.ca/~lcampbel/Gold.html

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[3]   ‘Soil arsenic from mining waste poses long-term health threats’, 20120322 by Dora Pearce, Research Fellow at Melbourne School of Population Health, University of Melbourne, published in The Conversation, ^http://theconversation.com/soil-arsenic-from-mining-waste-poses-long-term-health-threats-5901

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[4]   ‘What are the effects of arsenic on human health?’, ^http://www.greenfacts.org/en/arsenic/l-2/arsenic-7.htm

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[5]   ‘Is there a cancer cluster in a CQ mining town?’ , 20141113, by Rachael Conaghan (Dysart in Central Queensland), ^https://www.dailymercury.com.au/news/is-there-a-cancer-cluster-in-a-cq-mining-town-conc/2452092/

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[6]   ‘Walhalla, Dec-Jan 2012-13‘,  20130303,  ^https://daynaa2000.wordpress.com/2013/03/03/walhalla-dec-jan-2012-13/

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[7]   ‘Chronic arsenic poisoning‘, 2005, by Vanessa Ngan, Staff Writer, DermNet New Zealand – a world renowned resource all about the skin, ^http://www.dermnetnz.org/topics/chronic-arsenic-poisoning/

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[8]  ‘Thallium and Arsenic Poisoning in a Small Midwestern Town’, 2002,  by Daniel E Rusyniak at Department of Emergency Medicine and Division of Medical Toxicology, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis, IN, USA, and R. Brent Furbee and Mark A Kirk, ^https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/articles/11867986/

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[9]    ‘Cancer incidence and soil arsenic exposure in a historical gold mining area in Victoria, Australia: A geospatial analysis‘, 2012, by Dora Claire (University of Ballarat and Melbourne School of Population Health, The University of Melbourne), Kim Dowling (Melbourne School of Population Health, The University of Melbourne) and Malcolm Ross Sim (Monash University) in Journal of Exposure Science and Environmental Epidemiology (2012) 22, 248–257,  ^http://www.nature.com/jes/journal/v22/n3/full/jes201215a.html

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[10]    ‘A cross-sectional survey on knowledge and perceptions of health risks associated with arsenic and mercury contamination from artisanal gold mining in Tanzania’, 20130125, by Elias Charles, Deborah SK Thomas, Deborah Dewey, Mark Davey, Sospatro E Ngallaba and Eveline Konje, at BMC Public Health, BioMed Central, London UK, ^https://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-2458-13-74

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[11]   ‘Arsenic mine tailings and health’, 2015, Department of Health and Human Services, Victoria State Government, ^https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/healthyliving/arsenic-mine-tailings-and-health

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