Comments for Friends of the Box-Ironbark Forests

Comment on Burglars, super heroes and moss by Chris Timewell

Chris Timewell — Fri, 10 May 2013 23:16:51 +0000

Strange but true. Here’s a link to more information than you ever wanted to know about Moss Man! http://he-man.wikia.com/wiki/MossMan

Comment on Poverty Gully: achievements, and puzzles by Chris Johnston

Chris Johnston — Wed, 08 May 2013 22:38:01 +0000

We are trying a modified habitat hectares approach in the Muckleford forest (Maldon Historic Reserve) as it includes large trees. Results so far are that this forest lacks the number of large trees defined in the EVC benchmark – making these ‘almost large’ trees critical as they are the large trees of the future. Will post more details on the Muckleford forest blog soon.

Comment on Butterflies feeding on sap by Tony Morton

Tony Morton — Wed, 08 May 2013 08:44:58 +0000

It’s very bad news if this is an area to be ‘control burned’. Already this suspect activity has resulted in a Castlemaine Copper site being mistakenly burned in the Bendigo area. If this area too is burned in Autumn, it’s possible than the early stages of the butterfly might escape, as it is thought that the larvae will be in ant’s nests underground, but it is a risky thing to do when an endangered insect is involved.

Comment on Little Monster? by Tony Morton

Tony Morton — Fri, 15 Mar 2013 22:50:44 +0000

I think that it’s possible that we are going to have another infestation of Doratifera oxleyi (The Painted Cupmoth) next spring. Although not as numerous as in 2012, I have noticed dozens of the adult moths round lighted windows here in Vaughan for the past ten days. Their caterpillars (Stinging Joeys) will be defoliating eucalypts again. The trees seem to recover quickly but after this recent prolonged drought they will be under extra stress, which may be of concern.

Comment on Where’s the heritage? by fobif

fobif — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 10:08:44 +0000

Thanks for the comment Faisal. The interesting thing about those pipes is that they were part of a destructive process–and now they’re part of the recovery. In a way, they’re part of nature too.

Comment on Where’s the heritage? by Faisal Grant

Faisal Grant — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 11:46:54 +0000

This is a natural decay, and a natural decay of an introduced, alien entity. Let nature take over again, I say.

Comment on What exactly are the pine plantations? by Anthony Amis

Anthony Amis — Wed, 09 Jan 2013 13:18:04 +0000

hi,

plantations are certainly fire hazards – check out photos 5 and 6 on this page:
http://baddevelopers.nfshost.com/Docs/Midway3Wandong.htm

hancock lost 10,000ha in one day in feb 2009
http://hancockwatch.nfshost.com/docs/09feb.htm

hancock also attempted to rezone land in strathbogies in late 2010 to general farming zone. http://hancockwatch.nfshost.com/directory/benalla/LEGL93-60.html

[FOBIF NOTE: it's also of interest that the Kentbruck fire presently raging in South Western Victoria started and quickly spread through a pine plantation]

Comment on Comeback by Tony Morton

Tony Morton — Tue, 18 Dec 2012 00:38:55 +0000

Re. the Cup Moth caterpillars (aka Bondi Trams, Chinese Junks, Doratifera oxleyi!) – I think a virus (not unusual where there’s an overpopulation of insects) has wiped them, or most of them, out, perhaps helped by a parasite. No adult moths at all have come to my MV light this year. Last year scores of them did. From 2000 – 2010 I only saw the odd one.

Comment on Burning season under way by Alex Panelli

Alex Panelli — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 21:59:35 +0000

I am interested in the Planned Burning Exclusion Zones shown in the above table. 56,716 hectares, or roughly one sixth of the land in all the zones, totally protected from fire. I wonder what is necessary for land to be classified in this way, and what is lacking about the land that has not been. I also wonder what proportion this is of all the land in the region – including private land. I’m sure it is much less than one sixth. Is it even one sixtieth?

I note that in his reply to FOBIF on behalf of his minister, LeeMiezis, Executive Director, Fire (what a wonderful title!) for the Minister for Environment and Climate Change, wrote:
“Planned Burning is excluded from identified zones (Planned Burning Exclusion Zones) mainly to protect the environment – for example fire sensitive ecological communities.”
In his letter, this statement sits, rather oddly, immediately after a passage that states:
“it is important to recognise that fire is a vital part of our environment – in fact Victoria is one of the most fire prone areas in the world and many of our plants and animals depend on fire for their ongoing survival. Planned burning can help the environment to regenerate and maintain health, while having benefits of reducing the risk of bushfire causing significant change to natural ecosystems.”

I wonder if the “Executive Director, Fire” is conscious of the contradiction in what he has written, or if perhaps the ecological communities within the planned burning exclusion zones are in fact so different from those in other zones that there is no contradiction. In either case it would be good to know more. I wonder also if the Minister, whom the Executive Director serves, has a better understanding of this than I do.

But, if such contradictions really do lie (un-noticed) at the heart of our statements about fire, I wonder if our faith in our knowledge of such things, and in the benefits (or potential benefits) of the monitoring and science that is applied to them, is well founded.

Comment on Bendigo fire meeting [1]: what’s happening on the ground? by Chris Johnston

Chris Johnston — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 11:55:49 +0000

Some prescribed burns will start soon no doubt. It would be great to push hard on ‘prescriptions’ for particular species where we know they have been established by DSE – or push even harder where there are no prescriptions!

Habitat trees were a focus at Muckleford Forest community discussions last weekend, noting that the DSE approach of raking around large old and habitat trees is the WRONG approach. Raking around reduces the nutrient cycle of these trees – and they are so important in the nutrient cycling in the forests. Instead we shoud, advocate that DSE don’t light up near such trees as in most conditons the flames will die out before getting to their base. How far away? I’m not sure but others will know.

This is a prescription we could demand – identify and protect such trees. Yes it would mean pre-burn survey and marking of such trees (physically and with GPS) and then controlling the burn pattern. At least we could ask that they trial this in some selected areas and do pre and post burn evaluation. And perhaps comunity members might even contribute a bit of time towards tree marking?

What do others think – and what should we be advocating for inclusion in ‘burn plans’?

Chris