Some time ago I belonged to a local bushwalking club. One of our members was employed by DSE to oversee the operation of the timber industry in the mountains to the north of West Gippsland and the Latrobe Valley.
On one expedition to a logging coop he explained to us that it was mandatory for the tree fellers to leave the old stags because the leadbeaters possums used them for their nesting places. That was not all. After the coop had been cleared, trees was replanted and guess what. These young trees provided the very food that the possums thrive on.
On a related subject it is wrongly claimed that the timbet industry is responsible for the devastating fires which destroy the possums habitat. The crown fires which cause the major damage on a hot windy day need rubbish on the forest floor to sustain their intensity. Without that rubbish, the fire will not run. After the fires of a couple of years ago, I flew at a comparatively low level across the hills to the north of Healsville. This particular area had not been burnt but had been in the receipt of some embers from nearby. Where the embers had landed an individual tree had burnt, but the fire had not run because the forest floor was clean.
If the professor and his cohort wish to preserve the habitat of the possum and the other species in the forest, they would do well to get out into the forest and help the DSE to carry out more cool burns in the autumn instead of just locking it all up and creating the conditions for an inevitable firestorm.

David

Presumably, the leadbeater possum ‘saviour’ is an ardent opponent of cool burns that help minimise the accumulation of thick forest floor fuel and reduce the intensity of forest fires that otherwise would guarantee the absolute destruction of possums in the area.

Is the ‘do-gooder’ aware of the fact that owls are a natural predator of those possums, and if so, will there be a move now to cull those owls from the Victorian forests?

Exactly Mark, exactly!
Other threatened fauna are often subjected to captive breeding programs; and or, relocation to far safer habitats?

I wonder just how much damage the dumber than door knobs green inspired lock it up as N.P's caused; which in Vic, created the largest uncontrollable wildfire in history; and I daresay, wiped out hundreds of threatened or endangered species, which had to include hundreds of Leadbeters possums!

At least when we logged such areas, there were multiple logging roads that also acted as fire breaks.

And selective logging put many more eyes and knowledgeable fire fighters on the ground, fighting to save the very resource that feeds and clothes them; and puts a roof over their heads.

Moreover, electrically controlled grazing is far and away, a far better less carbon intensive method of reducing the fuel load!

Horses, i.e., will vegetate barren rock with their seed loaded manure!

And palatable grass may store more carbon than much slower growing trees! But particularly on virtually bare rock, where trees aren't currently possible, and cloven hooves do little damage! Ditto ground baked rock hard and impervious to water/rain, by successive burning!
Rhrosty.

However, most of this material has emanated from just one forester and it has often been contentious, particularly in relation to firIn addition, this forester is both a vocal proponent of timber harvesting and the figurehead of a political campaign for a the expansion of old growth harvesting.

The forester makes a lot more sense than the possum hugger.

Cobber the hound - could you take the time to point out where Mark Poynter's article is wrong or misleading, rather than just try a cheap, totally incorrect, shot?

My reading of it is that there is no campaign, political or otherwise, for the expansion of timber harvesting, which is at an historically low level. And as for 'old growth' forests, they have been completely safe from logging for at least 20 years! Poynter makes a good argument for the continuation of sustainable timber harvesting in the central highlands.

Tourism and the forest industry can continue to exist happily side by side, as they have done for over 100 years in the area. Importantly, extending the park area would not change the bushfire risk which is the main risk to possum populations. Critics must answer Poynter's well-argued case that massively extended national parks will not prevent decline in possum numbers.

We as a society recognised many years ago a simple truth; that in order to preserve what limited native forests we have left, along with the biodiversity and populations of native species they serve to protect, we needed to move to plantation timber. We did it not only for the environmental benefits but also to create and sustain timber resources and jobs.

This was done by providing massive tax breaks to plantation companies, so much so that the usual charlatans and thieves came to feast. There were impacts on farming communities and also admittedly some negative environmental consequences.

But the aim was to phase out native timber harvesting, particularly its ferocious feeding of the woodchip mills which exported jobs and essentially propped up the native forest timber industry.

And it worked.

The value of plantation timber has now outstripped our native forest timber many times over. On current prices Australia's plantation timber assets are worth 9.9 billion dollars while our standing native timber is just 1.5 billion. That's right less than a fifth and rapidly declining.

This of course doesn't mean timber companies are going quietly as this article demonstrates. They know that the timber royalties paid the the state governments are a quarter the cost per tonne compared to plantation timber and the almighty dollar features very strongly in their decisions.

But our values continue to change. Large sections of the community are rightly ashamed that Australia's rate of mammal extinction is the highest in the world and want our governments to do something about it. We are demanding more from those governments and they are appropriately reacting.

Moving to save the leadbeater possum is one such response.

SteeleRedux

You're rationale that plantations were established specifically to replace native forest timber production is wrong.

In 1964, the Australia Forestry Council instigated a massive program of softwood plantation establishment in recognition that the nation's growing population and demand for wood would exceed the capacity of native forests. These plantations were meant to complement the native forest resource not replace it, based on an appreciation that the two resources supply different products.

Similarly, the more recent hardwood plantation expansion was specifically to produce only woodchips, with no intent to replace hardwood sawn timber from native forests.

Yes, plantation timber now supplies most of the market because it has replaced native hardwood in its former high volume but low value uses. But it will never replace the demand for durable and decorative high value hardwood.

Your comparison of the value of plantations versus native forests is also problematic because most of the public native forests in southern and eastern Australia are now in reserves and so is no longer available for use. If it was still available, the value would be much higher of course.

You mention the need to 'preserve our limited forests' - the forests in question which support LBP still occupy over 95% of their original range and harvesting and regenerating a minor portion of them doesn't reduce their extent.

Your final two paragraphs suggest that you haven't read the article and appreciated that closing the timber industry will not save Leadbeaters Possum

SteeleRedux, I have another question for you and other readers to ponder. Why is there so much attention on 'saving' the leadbeaters possum? Because it is photogenic and lives in photogenic forests, of course! There is also a readily identifiable 'bogey man'. 'Good vs. evil', the simple black and white message beloved of the green movement. Shame for all those non-photogenic species that live in outback Australia under threat from cats and foxes. No money for the green movement in 'saving' those species so no-one hears about them. Shame one big fire will wipe out the leadbeaters possum...

SteeleRedux

What has the rate of Australia's mammalian extinction record got to do with the LBP? If you are implying there is a link between existing recorded mammal extinctions and native forest harvesting then such a link is spurious. Not one of the recorded mammalian extinctions was due to native forest logging, particularly as the vast majority are species that were inhabiting the semi-arid and arid interior, and where no eucalypt tree species utilised for sawn products are found.