Comments on: Another report on Black Saturday bushfires

By: jules

jules — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 00:21:26 +0000

“The spookiest natural landscape *I’ve* ever seen was… well, actually, let’s forget it. You really don’t want to know.”

I’ve got photos actually. I’ll upload them to my computer when the camera stops screaming.

Driving through Kinglake to St Andrews to visit someone in April last year was pretty spooky. Especially when we put old Sydney band Scary Mother on. Hairs on the back of the neck stuff.

nadnanb

Even the cow farmers fround here recognise the importance of cool burns at the right time of year, tho for different reasons, cooler burns don’t hurt the soil as much and pasture recovers quicker and stronger.

By: neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be

neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 01:30:39 +0000

Interesting point FDB, in the northern parts of the NT the research shows that remnant rainforest patches (from a really long time ago) are actually maintained through the judicious and planned use of fire. The theory is that Aboriginal people burn early in the “dry season” when the tall grass that has grown up dried out a bit and fallen over is still a bit moist, with the intention of producing a green pick reshooting that the kangaroos etc come to feed on. With burning like this the fires are smaller and go out (generally) at night. What this means is that fires will burn up to the edge of monsoon vine thickets and rainforest patches (where there is water present post wet season) and go out. If burning is not done early then fires that burn later in the dry season can penetrate the rainforest and reduce its range (because they are hotter and the fuel is drier). If no burning takes place over a long period of time the edge between dry forest and rainforest gets “hazy”, grass starts to penetrate and the rainforest often extends outwards. This is all fine until the inevitable fire comes, with it reaching further into the rainforest than before, As you rightly point out the only thing that comes back after this is the fire tolerant species. So the thing is that fire (ironically?) maintains rainforest.

In the desert regions a similar thing occurs with Mulga (Acacia aneura) which does not survive fire but whose seeds sprout after fire. The story I have heard is that there are now very few patches of remnant Mulga (with multiple aged trees) as the changed fire regimes mean that the above scenario is repeated: long term fire exclusion leads to hazy edges, grass penetrates, fire eventualy comes along and gets into the Mulga patches killing them all, leaving only single generation regrowth.

The nature and role of fire in the Australian landscape is something that we really need to do more work on methinks…

By: H.P. Lovecraft

H.P. Lovecraft — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 01:16:50 +0000

The spookiest natural landscape *I’ve* ever seen was… well, actually, let’s forget it. You really don’t want to know.

By: FDB

FDB — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 01:02:25 +0000

Likewise nadnanb – I can get a little het up about this after discussing it with so many utter boneheads, in whose number I do not count you.

Unfortunately for biodiversity though, regeneration is not always a good thing – every time an area burns, fire-loving (read: really fucking flammable) species are encouraged. So we lose stuff like the gorgeous temperate rainforests of myrtle beech. Snow gums too – they do come back, but only from the base, so other trees and scrub species can get a jump on them.

The spookiest natural landscape I’ve ever seen was on Lake Mountain in the snow about a month ago. Completely burnt (zero green) snow gum forest and a foot of snow, in cloud. So, like, misty and completely monochrome. Felt like I was climbing up to some Transylvanian castle. Till my little brother nailed me in the back of the head with a snowball and the moment was ruined.

By: neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be

neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:50:37 +0000

Hi again FDB, in part I agree with you, the point of humans managing forests is because they are used by humans. If there are no humans then some of the imperative around fire management disappears. However I think that the notion of an “unspoilt” forest is a recent invention. This idea (which I am not saying you are saying) that the forests of SE Australia are pristine, particularly if fire is excluded is, I think, wrong, and leads us to manage them inappropriately, particualry with reference to biodiversity. You see although I disagree with sensationalist comments like “400,00 Hectares of forest have been destroyed” on the news surrounding bushfire events (they are not “destroyed” as will be apparent when one looks at the recovery even after a fire event like Feb 7), I do think that it is better to have less intense fires overall, and good fire management gives the animals and plants a better chance than if just left alone (because the forest will burn eventually if left alone, and more intensely the longer they are left (the old density argument again!), even if arsonists are excluded- which is also unlikely).

And to finish thanks FDB for your ongoing engagement on this one. I have come to appreciate things differently as a result of it.

By: FDB

FDB — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:32:04 +0000

Sorry, I’m saying a whole bunch of things and haven’t been terribly clear about it. The main ones are:

Yes, of course the amount of fuel available to a fire is one of the main determinants of severity. Less important on Feb 7 than at any time since records have been kept though – the heat of the preceding week, strong variable winds, etc etc meant that the fire burned right through every kind of vegetation and density thereof. With the exception of a handful of non-eucalypt gullies.

Yes, woody grassland is a good kind of landscape – pretty, easy to move through, plenty of fauna and birds, good hunting, good for living in or near with the usual fire precautions. The problem I have is with the idea that we should “manage” what are currently tracts of relatively unspoilt forest teeming with biodiversity, in order to make them safer for grossly unsustainable semi-rural living.

By: neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be

neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 00:15:45 +0000

I think it is clear that we disagree. Perhaps you think that what I am saying is that a thinner forest would have meant that a large part of the devastation of Feb 7 would not have occurred. This is not what I am arguing. I did probably go a step too far and make it seem that what I was saying was that devastation would not have occurred- on this point I apologise. However the substantive point in terms of forests and fuel and fires. What I am arguing is that if you have less fuel, you have less heat. And to reinforce the point if you have less heat then you have less heat. This means that forests and the fires they can support are different if managed differently. What it does not mean is that devastating fires cannot or do not occur. However I think that we should not pretend that fuel loads (again in the canopy due to the denisty of forests, not the twigs and sticks and leaves on the forest floor that fuel reduction buringin targets) are not an issue. We cannot say that a thinner forest would have made NO difference. That may be the case, but also maybe not. My point is that a thinner forest is a safer forest- for humans animals plants etc- do you disagree that this may be the case after what you saw on/post Feb 7?

By: FDB

FDB — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 05:11:41 +0000

nadnanb – I don’t think you’ve really been reading what I’ve been writing. I invite you to give it another crack – it’s all just up above.

But on just one of your points – no. Thinner forest would NOT have helped on Feb 7th.

NOTHING AT ALL stopped the fire, except wind direction changing. Enormous open fields (I have SEEN them, 200-300metres across) did not stop the fire. Embers were flying a kilometre or more ahead of the front.

WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT???

By: neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be

neither a dissenter nor a narcissist be — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 01:06:54 +0000

Sorry wrong FDB, thinner forests would have helped on Feb 7, that is why long term management of the forest is an issue. A thinner forest has less fuel in the canopy, meaning that it cannot be as big (if you think this is untrue go out the back and make a fire, put more wood on it and see if it gets hotter, then put even more, and keep doing it, analysing the results).

I know it might be hard to accept that there is more dense forest now than circa 1800, but there are good reasons to suspect this is the case. A study on VRD station in the NT (published somehwere as “slower than the eye can see”) shows how the exlusion of fire since the 1880′s has led to tree thickening. Given we know that Aboriginal people all over the continent used the landscape to give them food, and we know that grassy landscapes support more animals (like kangaroos etc), which is why fire was a management tool, can you supply me with any reason to think why fire wasn’t extensively used in SE Australia. And if this is the case (unless you can point to areas where no Aboriginal people lived or visited) why would we not suspect that the forests were thinner and grassier (and as an aside far less dangerous for all involved)?

By: FDB

FDB — Tue, 15 Sep 2009 08:01:46 +0000

No of course not Ambigulous.

I just think it’s implausible that there was less total area of dense forest prior to 1800-odd than today.

I’d think there would be less total area today of every landscape type bar desert (about the same) and land fucked up by agriculture (heaps more).

I could be wrong, but in any case… here we are now with a choice of what to do. Do we look at our landscape and ask “should we reduce the fire hazard by thinning the forest artificially?” or do we ask “is it a good idea to live here? Can’t we just come here for a holiday when the weather’s nice?”.

And lastly, and I repeat, thinning forest would have done NOTHING to help on Feb 7th. Please visit the area if you doubt it.