Bundarrah Days

ON February 11, 2007, an article headed Face The Burning Question co-written by Dick Williams, Ross Bradstock and Bruce Esplin appeared in The Age.

It's been reviewed many times but I want to revisit it in the light of the tragic events of Black Saturday. My comments in bold.

THE large fires burning in eastern Victoria, thankfully, have been contained at last. Many believe that these fires are unnatural, disasters for the environment, and they wouldn't have happened if national parks hadn't been locked up and cattlemen kicked out of the high country. Are these views a sober appreciation of the facts? What do history and science tell us about bushfires?

Thankfully? Why thankfully when they are trying to make a case that these fires are natural and necessary?

In fact, while large areas of national park were affected, the bulk of the 2006-07 fires started in and burned through other types of land such as state forests. History shows that occasional large fires in south-eastern Australia are the norm. More than a million hectares were burnt in 2003, 1939, and 1851.

State Forest is now managed by Parks Victoria...so what's the difference? They say occasional large fires are the norm. Does occasionally mean three times in six years? You see, they had go back 152 years to find three fires that totalled 3 million hectares. Writing in March 2006 I only have to go back six years. Are these "occasional large fires " now regular or even frequent? If so, with what effect on our environment?

Large fires occur in south-eastern Australia because forests are flammable, the terrain is rugged, and most importantly because ignition, severe fire weather and intense drought conditions occasionally coincide.

Since when is the co-incidence of ignition, "severe fire weather" and intense drought more important than fuel? In 2009 we'd had drought for longer than in 2003 and 2006/07 and far more "severe fire weather" yet this year fire burnt about one third of the area burnt in each of the two previous fires? What does this tell us?

Are ecosystems destroyed by large fires? No, they are burnt and they regenerate. And they do not burn with uniform high intensity; some patches are roasted, others are lightly scorched.

Eco-systems are changed comprehensively by what has become known as "feral fire." This is a form of fire that is alien to the environment it burns in. It favours the regeneration of fire prone species.

And they do not burn with uniform high intensity; some patches are roasted, others are lightly scorched.

This is rather different from their claims about alpine grazing. In 2006 Williams et al claimed there was no difference between bushfire occurrence and severity on grazed and ungrazed land in the Bogong High Plains.

The regeneration capacity of local ecosystems is enormous. The Australian flora and fauna, from the Alps to the desert, have mechanisms that allow them to cope with, and even prosper, after large fires, provided they are not too frequent. Plants re-sprout and re-seed. Animals migrate, switch diet, and continue reproducing.

This is plainly wrong - a re-write of Australian fire ecology. Large fires on the scale of Black Saturday in dry schlerophyll forests did not occur pre-settlement. We know from historical records and Aboriginal tradition that indigenous Australians practiced regular burning across the landscape. Reports suggest that Williams himself is at present objecting to Aboriginal burning practices in northern Australia.Dry schlerophyll forest in Victoria was burnt regularly in low scale cool burns and the flora and fauna is adapted to that. Large fires were "occasional" and mainly limited to forests of Mountain Ash which burns on average one or twice a century for regeneration. These fires are "hot" due to the fact that they are occasional providing time for the build-up of massive fuel burdens. They did not spread from the mountain ash environment, however, due to the fact that the surrounding dry forests were burnt regularly in cool burns which were not hot enough to ignite the moister conditions in the wet forests. Of course it's a different story today.

This capacity has been hardened over millions of years of evolution on a flammable continent. However, the ability of Australian ecosystems to cope with occasional major fires has been compromised by clearing, ferals, fragmentation, logging and grazing.

Patent nonsense. No thinking person believes that fire in forests is affected by land that has been cleared of forest. As for forest industry, what happens after a forest is logged is the preserve of government agencies which are influenced by people like Williams, Bradstock and Esplin. If they become fire prone and suffer a loss of biodiversity that is the fault of those charged with supervising their recovery from disturbance.

We now have a major new challenge - climate change. Research, here and overseas, suggests that major fires will happen more often because of this. With this prospect in mind, we must do everything we can to protect people, property and the environment.

We already know what a lot of nonsense that is. Major fires will happen more frequently because forests carry heavy fuel burdens so obviously the threat from warmer conditions (if they arrive) will be dependent on how we manage our forests. If we manage them as William, Bradstock and Esplin advocate no one will be able to live near them safely, irrespective of climate change.

But can we eliminate these sorts of fires? Science indicates this is highly unlikely, so we need to know how to lower the risks large fires pose to the things that we value - people, property, and the natural environment. Research and experience shows this is a complicated business. It involves informed compromise and trade-offs, and the adaptation of solutions to suit local circumstances.

Don't you love it? Science indicates it is unlikely that we can eliminate major fires. What science? Their science? It seems that science is a very inexact science when it comes to fire. There's a whole body of bushfire science that is opposed to the ideas of Williams, Bradstock and Esplin. In fact, we can safely say the majority of "the science" is opposed to them. Their assertion here depends greatly on what they call "major fire" and they will change what they say constitutes major fire whenever it suits them.

Fires respond to many influences: weather, terrain, fuel and human behaviour. Our options for managing these influences are limited. We can't change the weather, at least in the short-term, but we can alter the behaviour of people and some fuels.

The first of these is fuel. Remember the equation - fire equals available fuel. We can control fuel so that the effect of the weather is more or less under control. Unfortunately, we can't control the behaviour of arsonists so we have to treat them as yet another ignition factor. And, it seems we can't control the behaviour of people like William, Bradstock and Esplin either so we have to take their lobbying into account as well.

Lowering risk may involve more cleverly targeted and increased fuel reduction burning in some forest areas - as recommended in the Victorian bushfire inquiry and Council of Australian Governments' inquiry. However, in other areas, such as alpine landscapes, frequent prescribed burning is not justified because of increased risk of environmental damage. Reducing risk may also require changes to the way we suppress fires, and how we equip the community to cope before, during and after major events.

Mountain Cattlemen have never advocated prescribed burning in alpine landscapes and the implication to be drawn from that comment is entirely wrong. Nor did we ever burn the alpine landscape. As I stated in my submission to the Senate Committee Enquiry into National Parks the real threat to the alpine landscape is wildfire emerging from the surrounding dry schlerophyll forests.

Some fuel treatments, such as grazing the high country, are simply ineffective. Grazing did not "reduce blazing" during the 2003 fires, or in 1939. After fire, stock eat the "green pick", and this hinders the natural regeneration of flora and fauna after the fires.

More lies. Grazing is effective at reducing blazing. But the simple truth is this - less grazing has a a lesser effect and it is this fact that rendered William's study on this issue pointless and dishonest. As I have said before this ploy is like batting Bradman at number 9 and complaining that he didn't hit a century. You can't say something doesn't work if you're not truly doing it. In addition, after the 2003 fires stock were not left to continue grazing alpine areas and so did not hinder any regeneration.

One thing is certain: playing histrionic blame games is pointless. It discourages us from gaining the understanding needed to solve a highly complex and poorly understood problem. Getting fire management right, rather, needs hard thought and informed choices about when and where to act.

Warning people of the outcome of the policies of these people is said by them to be the "playing of histrionic blame games." Let me remind you that this article originally appeared on 11 February 2007, almost two years to the day before Black Saturday. If warnings had been heeded then 210 Victorians may still be alive today. Nero fiddled while Rome burned and two years ago we had Williams, Esplin and Bradstock telling us that we needed to get fire management right. We had two more years of their management and what happened? Have another look at the video below!

THE fires of 2003, 2006-07 and 2009 do not come under the heading of tragic act of nature.

These were manufactured fires, born of a cynical manipulation of the natural environment where neglect does the job demanded of it by radical greens.

Manufactured fire is all about fuel. It was easy for green land managers to accomplish heavy fuel loads in our forests and they did that by implementing a program of totally inadequate fuel reduction burning.

It wasn't so easy on private farmland but the intent is plain to see. Native vegetation offsets are not about preserving native flora but about providing fuel for flames on private farmland assisted by laws and regulations against clearing fallen timber and other environmental waste.

Black Saturday was for the green movement the culmination of manufactured fire. Whilst we are not claiming that their agenda actually requires the deaths of innocent people we don't believe they won't care if it causes tragedy. It's all grist for the green mill.

What the green agenda does require is that people become so frightened or disenchanted by life in rural areas that they pack up and move back to town and the deaths of the more than 200 people who died on Black Saturday will be used as a means to end.

Even though of us who keep banging on about the dangers of the neglected bush play in the hands of green fanatics. We scare people too, even though it's not our intent.

We need to reassure people that our forests, managed as they should be, are a stable and safe environment.

There have long been fears that bushfire may become a weapon for terrorists and now it is though not in the way most would have expected. Fire has become the primary weapon of the environmental terrorists who have infiltrated our bureaucracies and control organisations such as the Victorian National Parks Association (VNPA). These are the people who "stack the woodshed" and wait for a fortuitous lightning strike, a fallen powerline or even a mad pyromaniac to set our country alight.

It's interesting that the VNPA only last year recommended that native vegetation offsets on private land be doubled. What has farmland got to do with a national parks lobby group? In brief, offsets are a requirement to replace one tree with more. If you have a problem tree affecting power lines or a fence, for example, and you want to remove it then under present regulations you have to plant 30 to offset the loss of the one you removed.

In the 2008 Land Health and Biodiversity White Paper the VNPA proposed that offsets be substantially increased. These new offsets were apparently to be set by science. However, no scientific evidence was presented in support of the proposal and the cost, of course, was to be borne by landowners. That is compelling evidence of a scheme to import manufactured fire to farmland

Depending on the findings of the Royal Commission there could be a case for the laying of charges of criminal negligence and conspiracy against senior conservation bureaucrats and other leading green activists over the Black Saturday fires. I know for a fact that Melbourne lawyers have discussed the potential for the laying of such charges.

The wilderness aspirations of the green movement, the subsequent lack of fuel reduction burning and other fuel reduction strategies and the imposition of native vegetation laws on farmers and other landowners is all evidence that manufactured fire is the weapon the green movement is using to try and remove human presence from our bushland.

I WAS very young when I first become familiar with the term bushfire. I was so used to hearing it I grew up believing that fire in the bush was something that we Australians just accepted as a fact of life.

I didn't know back then that fire came in different varieties depending on what was being burned and when. Too many urban Australians still don't know that simple fact and merely repeat parrot fashion what they've been told by the green movement - "fire is a natural part of of our environment - get used to it, dude!"

There's something really aggravating about being told to get used by fire by someone whose knowledge of fire in Australia is as lacking as their understanding of Australian vernacular.

The answer of course, is this. "Fire is a natural phenomenon mate, but how bloody natural is it when it's your hair in flames, ay?"

Let's get down to some facts. Australia's native flora and fauna has evolved with fire from the very beginning. Man's flirtation with fire on this continent started about 40,000 years ago. The Aborigines farmed with fire using it to clear ground for walking, to provide grass for game and even to nuture specific plant communities. This pattern of burning created a mosiac of recently burned country across the landscape that limited the spread of wildfires.

In addition to Aboriginal burning lightning has always been a prime source of ignition. Lightning fires, however, often occur in relatively benign conditions and can be suppressed quickly, often by moisture, unless, as has been the case in recent years there is a massive fuel burned available to burn.

Too many urban Australians fail to understand that our forests have changed significantly since European settlement. If they were confronted by the same bushland as the explorers encountered they wouldn't recognise it. And just as the bush has changed so has the nature of bushfire.

Nowadays the absence of frequent burning leads to a build-up of fine and heavy fuels resulting in the kind of holocaust fires we saw on Black Saturday.

The management of forests and fires is incredibly complex. The green mantra that "fire is natural, dude - get used to it" is far too simplistic and ignorant to warrant serious consideration and yet it rules the day. One tragedy leads to another.

We have to find a solution to our fire dilemma. Over the past six years lack of fuel reduction burning has lead to a massive increase in the area of bushland burnt by high-intensity fires - more than 4 million hectares since 2003.

There's also another problem. The exclusion of fire in eucalypt forests and woodlands, in the absence of other fuel reduction strategies, causes the proliferation of shrubs and litter. It's a fact that shrubs can significantly change the conditions in which overstorey eucalypts are growing. A shrub understorey shades out the forest floor, decreases soil temperatures and increases the moisture of the soil. Heavy layers of organic litter effectively mulch the forest floor causing changes in soil chemistry by altering the nitrogen cycling regime. These kinds of changes increase the vigour of pests and pathogens which in turn afffect the health of the forest.

In addition, and we've pointed this out so often, when forests develop a scrub understory it burns for longer with much greater intensity and as the trees have not evolved with these kinds of fires their health is badly affected.

RENOWNED American Fire expert, Stephen. J. Pyne is headed for Australia to provide expert advice and testimony to the Teague Royal Commission.

Professor Pyne of the School of Life Sciences at the University of Arizona has written two excellent books on fire in Australia - Burning Bush: A Fire History of Australia and The Still Burning Bush.

Bundarrah Days is very encouraged by the request to Professor Pyne to appear before The Commission because it suggests that it is going to be a very thorough inquiry.

Professor Pyne believes that the very basic error that land mangers have made in dealing with fire are persistent attempts to either eliminate it or suppress it instead of learning to live with it.

A couple of weeks ago, in the initial aftermath of Black Saturday, he wrote this:

"It seems likely that Black Saturday II will yield another royal commission. Much has changed over 70 years; Australians are more urban, more sensitive to environmental issues, keener to protect unique ecological assets. Yet perhaps they are substituting another, more modern delusion, striving to remake the burning bush into an unburnt Oz, only to find this vision also repeatedly obliterated by remorseless fire."

Indeed, some Australians are striving after this delusion and others have delusions of their own. The greens want more wildfire along the lines of Black Saturday because they believe it is a part of the natural cycle.

That is their delusion and it bears no resemblance to the natural cycle that existed before European settlement and prevailed for many thousands of years. What would Victorian forests like look now if we'd had the fire events of the past six years repeated time and again in a cycle over 40,000 odd years?

These holocaust fires are not natural. Just as the Australian environment has changed since settlement so has the nature of fire changed. A fire that is burning vast amounts of ground fuel built up over decades is not the same as a fire lit by indigenous people to promote the growth of grass for their game animals, for example.

Which fire would you prefer to live with? Professor Pyne invites us to make a choice because whatever happens we will always have fire with us.

I know which one I choose.