According to a new study published in the journal Nature Climate Change late last month, sequestering carbon dioxide is only one of the crucial climate-regulating attributes inherent to the world’s forests.
According to a new study published in the journal Nature Climate Change late last month, sequestering carbon dioxide is only one of the crucial climate-regulating attributes inherent to the world’s forests.
The early start to the bushfire season in NSW – 80 fires were burning yesterday across the state – will prompt many rural residents and the fire authorities to worry about whether this summer will see a repeat of last season’s drama in NSW or the terrifying ferocity of the 2009 Victorian bushfires. Predicting bad …
Plans to increase the area burnt across our forests and woodlands to meet a target that has no scientific backing is bad enough. But the plans to punch huge ‘fire breaks’ hundreds of kilometres long across the landscape is the ultimate insanity. Below are a few important points on the issue: A fire break will …
Despite once being described as common, mammals have been lost across the Australian landscape over the last 200 years. The impact has been particularly severe on Australia’s digging mammals, including iconic species like echidnas, bilbies and bandicoots. New research shows that the decline is not just bad for mammals, but for Australia’s ecosystems too. Through …
This is so insane it seems it can’t be real; while primary native forests are bulldozed and burnt over in East Gippsland (at our expense), the blue gum MIS plantations from western Vic (put in at our expense) are being bulldozed and burnt – because there’s no market for their wood! About 2.5 million acres …
Australia’s once common digging mammals that played an important role in ecosystem function, have been largely lost from our landscape. Around half of digging mammal species are now extinct or under conservation threat, and those that still exist have very contracted ranges. Bioturbation (digging and scratching) significantly alters soil processes, altering the chemical and structural …
Once again, government pyromaniacs destroyed extremely valuable ecosystems and a wildlife corridor in the Kirth Kiln Regional Park near Hoddles Creek (March 2013). This was two days before a total fire ban when rainfall for the prior 6 months had been the lowest ever recorded. The fire managers called it an ‘ecological burn’, but had …
The bushfires of 2012-13 in Victoria covered around 130,000 ha. The government has just proudly announced they have now burnt 250,000 ha of forest this Autumn (May 2013)! As well they have pumped about 18.3 million tonnes of C02 into the atmosphere. So what does this mean?Besides this being one massive unscientific experiment based on …
It’s cold now, but the debate over how to deal with higher bushfire risk is heating up. Firefighters and farmers around Australia are calling for more hazard reduction burns to reduce the risk of future fires, but the evidence isn’t in that this is the best approach. Tasmania had a hot, chaotic fire season, and …
The Climate Commission released a report this week called The Critical Decade, which makes the threats facing Australia abundantly clear. It spells out the drastic increase in extreme weather and its severity, and points to the increase in extreme heat and extreme bushfire weather. In my time as deputy commissioner of Fire and Rescue …
The Harrietville fire that was started by lightning on the border of the park and burnt towards Mt Feathertop, raced through previously burnt areas from the 2003 and 2007 Alpine fires. The area has also had extensive prescribed burns carried out. Back-burns are now sandwiching any wildlife that has managed to flee the fire edges.
