Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

The latest issue of Parkwatch magazine contains a pertinent article attacking a few popular myths about fire. Here’s a sample:

‘Our land managers seem to have been subservient to a litany of inherited myths, and display a puzzling lack of curiosity over recent research.

‘An important element of that research shows that fuel reduction burns will be effective for a few years, but can be followed by a couple of decades of greatly increased growth of flammable shrubs, followed over the long-term by relatively open and less flammable

‘Publication of those important studies has failed to alter fire management in Victoria; it hasn’t even prompted FFMV to implement a monitoring program whereby the changes in forest composition and structure are measured, over time, after management burns are performed.

‘Indeed since the 1930s, when the Victorian Government began formally recording its fuel reduction burns, there has been no program to monitor the results of those burns: no recording of changes in flammability levels over time, no documentation of understorey species changes or, for that matter, no measurement of effective increases in public safety.’ (FOBIF emphasis)

The article goes on to discuss  the relevance of indigenous approach to fire, and recent attempts to use Indigenous fire practices as somehow incompatible with current conservation thinking.

You can find the article here. Have a look.

Did you know that some large dragonflies can reach speeds of 70 kilometres an hour?

This intriguing info can be found in the latest issue of Wombat Forestcare magazine.

Australian Emperor (Anax papuensis) in a Norwood Hill dam. Dragonflies are carnivorous and can eat hundreds of mosquitoes in a day.

The issue contains an informative article about dragonflies, as well as some less fun facts about salvage logging in the Wombat-Cobaw area. Here’s a sample:

‘Following several visits to the Cobaws, it is hard not to be cynical when considering the government’s response to the storm damage there. While the removal of logs and dangerous trees on or close to tracks that impede fire mitigation is logical and appropriate, the use of large heavy machinery in sensitive habitats seems totally unwarranted. Once the logs have been removed it is expected that DEECA will conduct fuel reduction burns to reduce the amount of residual bush litter left following the salvage logging.

‘ If other fire affected parts of the Cobaws are anything to go by, this will see an abundant growth of bracken, which virtually excludes other types of understory, which is a very negative outcome in terms of a healthy biodiversity.’

You can read the magazine online here.

We have decided to postpone tomorrow’s early morning walk due to the wet weather. It will now take place next Tuesday (April 4). We will be meeting at Leanganook picnic area near the information signs at 6 am. If you are interested in going please register with Bronwyn Silver (info@fobif.org.au)

A few FOBIF members are planning an early morning walk on Mount Alexander on Tuesday 28 March. We will be following the route for Walk 20 in the FOBIF Twenty Bushwalks book. If you are interested meet at Leanganook Picnic area near the information boards close to the toilet block at 7 am. The walk will take about an hour. Contact Bronwyn (info@fobif.org.au) if you would like to register for the walk or have any questions and check this website before the walk in case of cancellation due to rain.

A foggy morning on Leanganook