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The Forum > Article Comments > Environmentalists responsible for much of Australia’s bushfire problem > Comments

Environmentalists responsible for much of Australia’s bushfire problem : Comments

By Tom Harris, published 4/2/2020

A major cause of Australia's fire problem has been the high 'fuel loads,' underbrush that, left to accumulate over years, acts as a tinder box for bushfires.

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No, it's not them but the coward decision-makers who kowtow to them and for a few votes! Imagine if we had bipartisan governments.

And if the labor and liberal parties exchanging preferences? Those tails that wag dogs would never get a guernsey! And the will of the people would be more accurately reflected as opposed to massively manipulated in dirty deals done at midnight!

It's heat per se, not fire specifically that breaks seeds open! Fuel load and bone dry conditions is a disaster of biblical proportions going somewhere to happen. Seeds that germinate in fire also germinate in baker's ovens proving it's heat specifically that opens them!

We could turn much off our national parks into man-made rainforest/wetland. Rain forests and wetlands act as natural fire breaks And could all be completely sustained by effluent currently flushed! And stormwater runoff.

There's more here than meets the eye, to confirm subjectively cherry-picked data.

Fuel can be reduced by a number of means, and intensive cell grazing is superior. One notes that selective logging assisted control as did annual grazing in national parks etc. And opposed at every turn by the lunatic fringe/green movement!

Yes, the runaway fires were the consequence of tinder-dry conditions and excessive record heat! Some were the result of back burning that escaped containment lines. Or traditional mosaic burning that did likewise!

Intensive cell grazing doesn't allow fuel to build up, but rather returns it to the fire-hardened ground broken open by sharp cloven hooves, as organic manure.

Introduced dung beetles ensuring it is buried to break down and sequester the carbon in more friable soil, that absorbs and retains more moisture.

If one can reduce the fuel load with grazed herd animals an for a profit, why burn feed as animals starve?

Not all environmentalists can be chucked into the crowd of green herd think!

And insane! As is promoting this (coal, lobbyist's) (burn baby burn) humbug!
TBC. Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Tuesday, 4 February 2020 11:11:51 AM
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The first animals to repopulate burnt bush are goannas.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=hpxeqiyQLlk
Posted by diver dan, Tuesday, 4 February 2020 11:29:09 AM
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Cont: There are some real solutions and ones that mean giving up rigid herd think and try some new ideas! New ideas resisted at every turn by incompetent administrations and others controled by just 15% of the nation (unions) and none of them concerned with the interests of the bush! Just winning and holding power for its own sake!

As long as a tiny minority want us padlocked to foreign-owned and foreign-controlled coal?

Not very much will change apart from creative carbon accounting!

We need to return the inmates to the asylum and put rational adults in charge!

We just don't need anymore narcissistic egotistical egoists at the helm and steering the ship of state in ever decreasing circles as they scapegoat their decisions or lack thereof!

Or put the earplugs in and talk, talk, talk!

We stand on our record, etc, etc. yackitty yack, blah, blah, blah!

And smile, you're on candid camera. Another photo op! Yummy!

Nudge nudge, a nod is as good as a wink to a blind horse. Know what I mean?
Alan B.
.
Posted by Alan B., Tuesday, 4 February 2020 11:51:00 AM
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Same old. Same old. Another in OLO's repetitious line of News Limited like commentators blaming "leftwing" environmental messengers and firebugs.

Climate Change (for Whatever Reason) increaasingly = Drought where fire can spread and faster = Longer, More Svere Fire Seasons

Basically fuel load reduction is a Furphy in many/most cases.

Fuel load burning is not a solution where:

A. many coastal and inland homeowners (from SA, VIC to Qld) wish to build their homes in existing or expanding forests.

B. in vulnerable cities and towns where suburbanites have large gumtrees or pinetrees in their backyards/frontyards

C. where much fuel load is mixed into farmland. Understandably Farmers don't want their mixtures of homes, sheds, paddocks, windbreaks, orchids, and carbon-credit tree clusters burnt down by others.

D. RFS managers report that Fire seasons are now so LONG that days/windows to do hazard/fuel reduction is now vey short and, even then, it is often too Wet for burning off.
Posted by plantagenet, Tuesday, 4 February 2020 12:10:47 PM
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'Environmentalists have themselves to thank for much of Australia's bush fire problem.'

you actually mean the people hating Greens Tom. They create mess after mess in society and then blame everyone else.
Posted by runner, Tuesday, 4 February 2020 12:20:50 PM
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Hear, hear and well said Pete, thank God there are still a couple of rational thinkers commenting in this space.

Loads of broken record rhetoric here. Typically by, learn nothing new, runner, still pushing his blame shift diatribe.

As for smile a lot pollies dishing out cash, never ever allow a photo ip and look at me, look at me, I'm a good guy. Are part of the problem?

Why, because like a moribund runner they can't see the solutions staring them in the face, for the ideological imperative that determines every position/decision.(Can't see the forest for the trees?)

Today's parliaments are chock full of folk who to a generic man are part of the problem not part of any real solution.

Deionization dialysis desalination is part of a range of viable solutions that rather than harm the economy, massively turbocharge it!

And doesn't our economy need just that sort of stimulus just right now!?

Some of my usual detractors would just love to label me green, but can't because of my well-known stance on CARBON FREE nuclear energy. Which along with four times cheaper deionisation dialysis desalination and broadacre irrigation are an integral part of any real solution!
Alan B.
Posted by Alan B., Tuesday, 4 February 2020 4:45:26 PM
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Some great ideas, Alan B.
Posted by plantagenet, Tuesday, 4 February 2020 9:37:08 PM
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Regardless of the primary cause of the bushfire, there is the added risk of unfavourable winds carrying burning embers from that fire to a distant location where fuel load has not been reduced by recent controlled burning, thereby starting a new fire.

With regard to protection of wild animals in bushfire-prone areas, one has to be hard to be kind, viz. carrying out slow controlled burns, thus allowing those animals to escape with much-reduced risk of harm and minimal damage to their habitat.

Avoiding doing controlled burning results in what we have seen of late – extremely intensive bushfires that incinerate all animals in their path .
Posted by Raycom, Tuesday, 4 February 2020 9:45:46 PM
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Well meaning environmentalism inspired policy is causing problems.
Unfortunately the number of people with genuine hands on land management experience is a miniscule percentage of our mostly urbanized population.
The tendency toward catastrophism of 'environmentalists' resonates with many, and it's a democracy.
The end result has been fairly centralized, one size fits all, policy and state control of all land management.
History is riddled with the failures of state control but it's where we've ended up. The fuel build up and consequential fires are just another example.
My expectation is the lesson won't be learned and we'll end up with more state mandated, one size fits all, policies that'll create a whole new set of problems on top of the existing ones.
Posted by jamo, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 12:33:00 AM
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HI FRIENDS
THIS IS MY FIRST POST IN ENVIRONMENTAL RESPONSIBLE FOR MUCH OF AUSTRALIAS BUSHFIRE PROBLEM. THANKS https://snsngirls.com/
Posted by NIOS NEWS, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 4:24:48 AM
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Environmentalists have themselves to thank for much of Australia's bush fire problem.'

http://karmasathe.com/
Posted by NIOS NEWS, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 4:28:01 AM
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Environmentalists have themselves to thank for much of Australia's bush fire problem.'

https://snsngirls.com
Posted by NIOS NEWS, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 4:29:38 AM
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'Environmentalists have themselves to thank for much of Australia's bush fire problem.'

http://snsngirls.com/
Posted by NIOS NEWS, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 4:31:37 AM
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One of my former employers lived at Picnic Point, Sydney, which is a waterfront suburb completely surrounded by dry forest. A local resident was a very rich man with his own helicopter pad on the roof of his enormous house, and a helicopter, and a bulldozer. The man was a "working class millionaire", an ordinary working man who had made good in the trucking industry and in clever real estate purchases. He owned hundreds of acres of dry bushland around his house which he intended to sell as a housing estate in future.

He was well known and liked in the area for volunteering to help new residents clear their land with his bulldozer. He loved his bulldozer. He cleared his own land of undergrowth using his machine to prevent bushfires, which always seemed to originate in the northwest near the road cutting through the Holsworthy Army base. He left all of the trees, just removing the worst of the most flammable undergrowth and collecting the accumulated fallen timber fuel which was mulched. Sooner or later, it was all going to be a housing estate anyway.

After clearing his land, he was reported to the council by a Picnic Point resident, a woman who was outraged at what he did, and the man was prosecuted and very heavily fined.

When the expected bushfire eventually came, it came from the very direction that the man had predicted. All of the women and children in Picnic Point were evacuated including the woman who had dobbed the rich man in and got him into trouble, while the men stayed behind to defend their homes. All of the men vowed to fight to defend every other persons house from the fire, except for the woman who had endangered them all with her environmental stupidity. Her house could burn to the ground for all they cared, and they would just stand around and watch.

The fire was stopped at the firebreak the rich man had created on his own land.
Posted by LEGO, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 4:53:28 AM
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Another true story.

One of the worst places anybody can build a home in bushland is on top of a ridge. Bushfires will burn much faster and hotter going uphill than they do downhill. Unfortunately, the tops of ridges where roads can be easily built is where many people build homes.

One such resident who's home fronted a national park and dry forest, got the idea that building a brick fence below his house fronting the forest would cause the heat from any bushfire climbing the ridge to be redirected upwards and over his house. After he did this, he was told by his local council that he was violation some obscure ordinance forbidding the building of structures fronting national parks.

The resident fought the council in court for a decade which cost him a bucket load of money, with the council eventually winning. The resident was told to demolish his brick wall. Before he could do that, the expected bushfire came and every house in his street was destroyed, except his own.

Fire brigade authorities were intrigued over how effective his wall had been at stopping the fire and protecting his home, and recommended to the state government that such walls should be mandatory in ridgeline developments.
Posted by LEGO, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 5:07:03 AM
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One has to keep in mind that the AGW deniers do not know about a number of factors, including:

1. They do not know that the burning of fossil fuels like coal, oil and gas will create CO2.

2. They do not know that CO2 when trapped in the atmosphere will produce what scientists call the greenhouse effect.

3. They do not know what the greenhouse effect is.

4. They do not know that the greenhouse effect will cause heat to be trapped and stored in the atmosphere.

5. They do not know that the greenhouse effect exists.

Any other points they do not know about?
Posted by Mr Opinion, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 6:21:36 AM
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The EPA was founded & is made up of so-called environmentalists & they are the architects of all the the legislations that enabled the massive fuel load to accumulate. Now they're trying to tell us it's not their fault !
If I had my way, environmental issues should be dealt with by local expertise not by city based, city mentality pseudo Academic "experts".
As soon as these people are kept at bay, everything will start to improve !
Posted by individual, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 7:35:59 AM
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Alan B,

"Intensive cell grazing doesn't allow fuel to build up, but rather returns it to the fire-hardened ground broken open by sharp cloven hooves, as organic manure."

Just a small point, cloven hooves compact the soil, that was why mobs of sheep were used to compact aircraft runways in WWII and hence the 'sheep's foot roller' that is used today.
http://www.google.com/search?q=sheepsfoot+roller&rlz=1C1CAFB_enAU718AU718&oq=sheeps+foot+roller&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j0l7.19033j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Pigs do an excellent job of breaking up the soil but they do it with their tusks and snouts and mobs of wild pigs already cost the country many millions of dollars likewise goats, many of our smaller wallabies face extinction because of wild goats taking over their habitat, they kick (butt) them out of sheltered camping caves and overhangs and the wallabies die from exposure in winter

Many of your points are good but this one is not.
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 7:44:01 AM
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We overlook around fifty thousand year of skilled bush management by our first people.
Instead of seeking new ways of coping with a very old challenge, we should make use of our indigenes’ knowledge in the use of fire in making our bushlands safe to inhabit.
Posted by Ponder, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 9:15:32 AM
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Noticed and interview of Sussan Ley on sky last night. It was the Front Page program. The chap raised the point of farmers being prosecuted for clearing their land. She deflected to the states like they do. To his credit he blocked her escape raising her departments vigor enforcing the epbc act. With the eyes of a true believer she spoke of the importance of habitat protection.
Cluelessness or susceptibility to departmental capture, or both, seems a disastrously typical feature with environment ministers.
Expect no change punters.

Watching the same channel some days ago Gary Hardgrave and Bronwyn Bishop both lamented voting for the laws causing these problems. Gary said back then he had no idea the laws'd be used they way they have and Bronwyn pointed directly at the epbc act saying it needs to be repealed. Refreshingly frank words from those two which only highlights the deafening silence of the rest. They all know.
Posted by jamo, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 11:18:47 AM
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Alan's idea of cell grazing, in a way, isn't far off the mark.
It goes to what concerns me with this new fervor for burning as a solution in itself. Unless you can graze fairly hard afterwards, burning, in the longer term will just create thicker scrub.
This is where the epbc act (my pet hate) starts causing it's problems.
The epbc act specifically prohibits alteration of the vegetation balance in areas containing vegetation "communities" listed as threatened. We're not talking "endangered" species here. "Threatened" status has been applied to forest communities common as remnant patches of bush in farmed areas. The "threat" was only that those patches might be cleared one day. Not about endangered species protection at all.
To ensure these areas continue to grow into impenetrable fire bombs the epbc act also prohibits construction of new infrastructure. Not even fire breaks and clearways for fences. Not even stock water infrastructure. This makes the necessary hard grazing almost impossible, if not illegal
Posted by jamo, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 1:19:04 PM
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yep we see in the Financial Review that Japan is scheduled to build another 22 coal fired power stations. Any protest outside the Japanese Embassy? These warmist are loud, irrational and incapable of thinking past their failed narrative.

ttps://www.afr.com/markets/commodities/japan-to-build-22-coal-power-plants-despite-climate-concerns-20200204-p53xms?fbclid=IwAR3SLfmH2VIam_fPqWahFUHoxhrPVgdwG4v97Yu_HfdqEbP7vyrd3xLD0J4
Posted by runner, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 2:40:49 PM
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Oh my God. What a truck load of horse manure this article is.

The rainfall graph he puts up is for the whole of Australia, this is the one for the Southern part of the country where the bushfires have been.
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/change/index.shtml#tabs=Tracker&tracker=timeseries&

This was the prediction put out by the CSIRO and the BOM in 2015;

“Extreme rainfall events will increase but overall rainfall is expected to drop in southern Australia, apart from Tasmania, during the winter and spring months – by as much as 69% by 2090.”

Virtually every assertion in this sorry excuse for an article is bogus. I defy anyone to defend a single one of them.

The on the ground fact of the matter is the NSW Parks service did twice as much fuel reduction burning in the last 10 years as it did in the previous ten. How on earth does that sustain an argument that environmentalists are to blame for increasing fuel loads? It doesn't.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 3:42:11 PM
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Steele,

Environmentalists are responsible for increasing fuel loads along the sides of country roads and the consequent danger during bushfires.
http://www.google.com/search?q=Taking+dead+wood+from+the+roadside&rlz=1C1CAFB_enAU718AU718&oq=Taking+dead+wood+from+the+roadside&aqs=chrome..69i57.17934j1j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Environmentalists had a bit to do with Torrington burning; from the 'Glen Innes Examiner'.

"Eucalypt is growing literally inside the ruins of Torrington as a community smashed by a bushfire some blame on a lack of firebreaks and bad forest management wants to know when government agencies will cut back the dangerous trees from the edge of their village.

About 16 homes in the isolated village of about 100 residents were smashed by bushfire nearly three months ago and, as of last weekend, still lie where they fell, many of them surrounded by yellow hazard tape.

Local koolie dog breeder Thomas Eveans said the town will live in fear that it could all happen again if government fails to cut back the forest of eucalypts which grow within metres of the town itself, which he said fed last year's blaze."
http://www.gleninnesexaminer.com.au/story/6601953/eucalypts-threaten-second-torrington-blaze-say-residents/?cs=422
Posted by Is Mise, Wednesday, 5 February 2020 4:37:00 PM
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Dear Is Mise,

This is Richard Cook's place. He was named in the article as wanting more fire breaks. Click on satellite view to see how much forest is around his house.

http://www.google.com/maps/place/66+Silent+Grove+Rd,+Torrington+NSW+2371/@-29.3096588,151.6882574,637m

I'm trying to understand what this bloke wants. It seems he is calling for fire breaks further away from his property so he can enjoy having forest surround his own place. He built in an incredibly vulnerable position with trees right up to his place. How is that kind of thinking the fault of environmentalists?

Scroll down to see Thomas Evean's place. His block had tall trees around his house as well.
http://www.cessnockadvertiser.com.au/story/6592006/fires-uncleared-ruins-spark-mental-health-crisis-say-residents/

I do sympathise with these residents as losing your home would be devastating. However are we going to end up with highly cleared forests just so people can feel a little safer in homes surrounded by their own eucalyptus?
Posted by SteeleRedux, Thursday, 6 February 2020 12:47:36 AM
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Steele,

You've shot the messengers now how about addressing the alleged problems?
Posted by Is Mise, Friday, 7 February 2020 6:04:50 PM
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Dear Is Mise,

Easy. Don't allow people to build hard up against eucalyptus forests.
Posted by SteeleRedux, Friday, 7 February 2020 7:15:13 PM
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Steele,

I quite agree and at the same time allow people to clear those dangerous trees from anywhere near their houses.
In a fire, a eucalypt is akin to a fair size tin of kero!!

There was a bit in the Telegraph today about proposed legislation in Queensland that addresses the problem and among other things recommends the planting of fire retardant trees.
Posted by Is Mise, Saturday, 8 February 2020 4:58:17 PM
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