The burning bush
According to Judaeo-christian legend, Moses was once startled by a message delivered by a burning shrub in the desert where he wandered. The burning bush we are presented with on an increasingly regular basis brings quite a different message:
Build your house not upon the the bushland
Or at least, be prepared for the consequences.
When the first human inhabitants of this country arrived some forty odd centuries ago, they found a land so completely unlike the one we have now that we would not recognise it if we saw it. A vast inland sea, massive lush rainforests on all sides, and gigantic animals, the size of which are not seen outside Africa, in modern times. Then, the climate changed.
Whether the people had a lot, or a little, to do with that change remains a subject of much conjecture and debate among ecologists, anthropologists, and many scholars of various persuasions. It's not really a matter of importance to us, though. What is important, is what happened. The continent began to dry out, Leaving behind the salty deserts which now fill much of the interior of this wide brown land.
The rainforests receded, and were replaced for the most part by sclerophyllous forests, the Eucalyptus and Acacia forests so distinctive of modern Australia. These forests, for better or worse, rely on fire in order to survive. The Eucalypts to remove competition from old declinging trees, the Wattles to actually germinate the seed of these generally short lived species. There are hundreds of thousands of plants adapted to this fire cycle, giving our landscape it's distinctive appearance. And the people adapted too. Moving each season into recently burnt territory, enabling them to avoid the of loss of lives to the annual fires.
That we Europeans also love this countryside so dearly we want to live among the trees, as they did, is not surprising. It is a beautiful and unique environment we have also inhabited in the last 200 years. But it is also, not surprisingly, completely at odds with what most of us expect from a place of residence. It is dry, volatile, physically dangerous and generally unpleasant for traditional "European style" settlements. The produce of such forests is also unpalatable, or invisible to the modern settler, aside from the timber which is pretty much all we take out of them.
Indeed, clearing the bush obviously removes many of the problems, but what effect does that have on the overall environment? Aside from the obvious visual impact of removing all trees, it has noticeable effects on water tables, soil fertility, and probably even rainfall, not to mention species diversity, both floral and faunal. Or we can choose to live amongst the trees, and enjoy their gnarled, wizened beauty from our comfortable verandahs, overlooking the surrounding bushland, and all the locals for which they provide habitat.
Whichever choice we make, we can not act surprised when, as they have for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, the forests burn, fiercely, to the ground, taking with them the buildings and infrastructure we have built in their proximity. This is beyond a fire management issue. This is a problem of engineering.
A fire proof house is a possibility. A self protecting farm is not beyond reason. Forward planning can prevent the property loss and damage that these fires are inflicting, and will continue to inflict as long as these forests survive. People lose their lives trying to protect property, which is the only real tragedy of natural events such as these. Perhaps we should heed the message of the burning bush, and move out of the forests, leaving them to renew themselves without our heavy handed management practices. Or, we can learn to live with them, avoiding the cyclic destruction of peoples' lives through poorly designed, alien structures we erect in their territory.
Build your house not upon the the bushland
Or at least, be prepared for the consequences.
When the first human inhabitants of this country arrived some forty odd centuries ago, they found a land so completely unlike the one we have now that we would not recognise it if we saw it. A vast inland sea, massive lush rainforests on all sides, and gigantic animals, the size of which are not seen outside Africa, in modern times. Then, the climate changed.
Whether the people had a lot, or a little, to do with that change remains a subject of much conjecture and debate among ecologists, anthropologists, and many scholars of various persuasions. It's not really a matter of importance to us, though. What is important, is what happened. The continent began to dry out, Leaving behind the salty deserts which now fill much of the interior of this wide brown land.
The rainforests receded, and were replaced for the most part by sclerophyllous forests, the Eucalyptus and Acacia forests so distinctive of modern Australia. These forests, for better or worse, rely on fire in order to survive. The Eucalypts to remove competition from old declinging trees, the Wattles to actually germinate the seed of these generally short lived species. There are hundreds of thousands of plants adapted to this fire cycle, giving our landscape it's distinctive appearance. And the people adapted too. Moving each season into recently burnt territory, enabling them to avoid the of loss of lives to the annual fires.
That we Europeans also love this countryside so dearly we want to live among the trees, as they did, is not surprising. It is a beautiful and unique environment we have also inhabited in the last 200 years. But it is also, not surprisingly, completely at odds with what most of us expect from a place of residence. It is dry, volatile, physically dangerous and generally unpleasant for traditional "European style" settlements. The produce of such forests is also unpalatable, or invisible to the modern settler, aside from the timber which is pretty much all we take out of them.
Indeed, clearing the bush obviously removes many of the problems, but what effect does that have on the overall environment? Aside from the obvious visual impact of removing all trees, it has noticeable effects on water tables, soil fertility, and probably even rainfall, not to mention species diversity, both floral and faunal. Or we can choose to live amongst the trees, and enjoy their gnarled, wizened beauty from our comfortable verandahs, overlooking the surrounding bushland, and all the locals for which they provide habitat.
Whichever choice we make, we can not act surprised when, as they have for thousands of years before Europeans arrived, the forests burn, fiercely, to the ground, taking with them the buildings and infrastructure we have built in their proximity. This is beyond a fire management issue. This is a problem of engineering.
A fire proof house is a possibility. A self protecting farm is not beyond reason. Forward planning can prevent the property loss and damage that these fires are inflicting, and will continue to inflict as long as these forests survive. People lose their lives trying to protect property, which is the only real tragedy of natural events such as these. Perhaps we should heed the message of the burning bush, and move out of the forests, leaving them to renew themselves without our heavy handed management practices. Or, we can learn to live with them, avoiding the cyclic destruction of peoples' lives through poorly designed, alien structures we erect in their territory.
posted by The Last Scientician at 9:36 PM
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