Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

On Tuesday October 9 DSE officials met with about 30 individuals and representatives of conservation groups to discuss outcomes of the consultation process around the Fire Operations Plan.

The discussion was limited by the fact that the biggest factor in fire management and practice is the government’s directive to DSE to burn 5% of public land, and this is not negotiable. It seems that DSE has a ‘burn reform’ process under way, but details of how this might improve environmental management are completely vague. For the moment we have to confront the fact that, in the words of one DSE official: ‘The elephant in the room is that the burning program is going to have effects on the environment.’ Changes in this program have to come from changes in the political arena.

Although FOBIF believes that the 5% target is foolish, we think that improved practice can limit the damage which overburning causes. We are therefore keen to engage DSE in any way which can improve environmental practice without compromising public safety.

From the general to the specific

Discussion therefore centred on operational matters. The following comments by DSE officials are a representative sample:

‘We have a duty as public servants to ensure that good information underpins decision making.’

‘Our duty is to put in place protection measures based on information received.’

‘Through this process it is our duty to have all values identified in all burn units.’

We have no reason to doubt the sincerity of these statements—but  they have to be put up against the brute fact that DSE data bases have been unable to accommodate information accumulated over the years.

Zone 3 area near White Gum Track: biodiversity values are recorded before burn operations, but DSE data bases are incomplete. Further, pressure to meet targets means these values are overlooked. It is conceded that 'research' underpinning operations does not relate to specific burns, but only to general ideas about types of vegetation.

Burns are managed according to general principles, not detailed local information. This is a fundamental deficiency in the operations. There is a further practical problem. Burn areas are assessed by biodiversity staff for ‘every single value’ recorded for that area, and these are incorporated in the burn plans. But this is a desk based activity: on the ground topography or weather conditions might mean that the workers managing the fire may not be able to work around these values. The brutal reality is that they have to be practical. In the words of the biodiversity officer: ‘they take [biodiversity] advice on board knowing that they still have a target to reach.’ In other words, biodiversity–and therefore forest health–comes second to achieving the target.

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Some anguish was expressed in the meeting about the inflexibility of the zones. Members will recall that we are concerned at the large Zone 1 area on Mount Tarrengower, and the Zone 2 south of Guildford. The fact is that the consultation run by DSE over zoning was little noticed [see our 2011 reports here and here]: local conservationists managed to have some zones changed in this process, but some were unnoticed. It’s fair to say that the hugely expanded burn program is bringing home to people some of the deficiencies in theory and practice which had been relatively unnoticed until recent years. Although FOBIF participated in the 2011 process, there were sections of the Zone map which escaped our attention.

Mount Tarrengower, south side: it's proposed to burn this area every five years.

This is increasingly an important problem. For many years DSE has tacitly acknowledged that Zone I [which is burned every 5  years] is an ecological sacrifice area: it’s a permanent artificially created fire zone, probably infested with weeds. Recent changes to the prescriptions for Zone 2 mean that these areas are not much better. In other words, the requirement to prioritise concern for human life has been interpreted as the requirement to destroy large areas of bushland. The Tarrengower area is a good example: it is proposed to burn 90% of this 285 ha area at the top of the mountain every five years. This is disastrously inside the ‘tolerable fire interval’ established by fire ecology experts for this environment, and if it is pursued, the mountain will look very different inside fifteen years. DSE has acknowledged the impact this will have on natural values [not to mention tourism], and is apparently looking for ways to deal with it. In particular, it was suggested that the Zone 1 section of Kalimna Park may be fuel reduced by means other than fire. Zone 1 prescriptions allow for fuel reduction by means other than burning [for example, mowing or slashing]: it’s hard to see why these means are not used more widely.

Burn intensity

In some cases, a patchy low intensity burn is preferable to a high intensity burn. It is apparent that from both the fuel reduction and biodiversity points of view some high intensity burns increase fuel hazard following the burn and reduce biodiversity values. Asked ‘how do you control burn intensity’, DSE replied that this was done via prescriptions in the burn plans. These

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