Prescribed Burning in the Gibson Desert
Submitted: Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 16:56
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Department of Environment & Conservation (DEC)
The Dept. of Environment and Conservation (WA) will be conducting aerial burning trials in the
Gibson Desert Nature Reserve and surrounding UCL. This burning will be carried out in partnership with the traditional owners of the area. The burning will occur between the 6th and 10th of August.
The approximate area affected by the program this year is between the
Eagle Hwy (W), the Gunbarrel Hwy (S), the Patjarr access road (E), and the
northern boundary of the reserve (N). There are several cells totalling ~350,000ha to be potentially treated with a predicted 5% burnt area result.
In the last 10 years there have been several large wildfires that have burnt vast tracts of land and have potentially seriously impacted the local biodiversity of the area.
The aerial burning trial is designed to strategically reintroduce a fine scale mosaic (burnt patches < 1,000ha) over seleceted areas. This will gradually provide a patchwork of burnt areas similar to what was found when the Aboriginal people traversed the land and massive wildfires were uncommon.
A map showing the target area will be found on www.dec.wa.gov.au during the burning operations.
Reply By: MintabiePete (NSW) - Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 18:24
Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 18:24
Yes the Americanism is really showing now isn't it , wildfires , why cant they call them bushfires , they used to have them in my time in the bush for regrowth , and I thought they still did in some areas .
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Reply By: equinox - Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 19:00
Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 19:00
Excellent idea. Some of that area has not seen a fire in many many years. Some of it has too...
It will be a good thing in the long run.
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Reply By: Member - Chris R (NSW) - Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 20:04
Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 20:04
Respectfully suggest that the matches be kept for the
camp fire and the aeroplane hours be savedfor better things.
Suggest let the system fall back into more natural balances.
The fact that result is a 5% burnt area should be enough to show that it is wasted effort in any case.
Cheers
Chris
AnswerID:
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Follow Up By: RDFB - Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 22:47
Thursday, Jul 31, 2008 at 22:47
Leaving it to 'more natural balances' is the reason for the massive size and long burning bushfires seen in the deserts in the last 20-30 years. I'm sure lots of people on this site have seen the impact of landscape size fires.
The landscape has been change over thousands of years of Aboriginal burning, so much so that these huge and frequent fires are potentially completely altering the landscape.
The way I understand is that a 5-10% mosaic over 5-10 years gives a good balance of 'old' fuels and mosaic fuels ages that are shown through much research into the area, is the best situation for maintaining 'biodiversity' and habitat.
We can either ignore the issue of these fires or start to try and save something of our desert ecosystem.
WA is world leader in its prescribed burning program, what better skills to apply to an area that has been 'forgotten' about for so long.
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Follow Up By: Member - Chris R (NSW) - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 09:14
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 09:14
Dear RFDB
The aboriginal 'management' practices over thougsands of years has changed the landscape. I think it is pretty
well understood that they burned for food and convenience - not for some higher order desire to increase or protect bio diversity.
Fact is that your 'management' today is only another imperfect and questionable interference in a natural system which is perfectly capable of looking after itself. After all, it created bio diversity - not us.
I hope that once you do your burn, you will then give it away - because you will have created the 'mosiac' you expect nature to then work with??
Cheers
Chris
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Follow Up By: RDFB - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 11:27
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 11:27
G'day Chris,
I have no problems with discussing this topic - its good to have all opinions (they're all useful!).
Yes the aboriginal people burnt for convenience etc, but the they also knew when and where to burn in order to find certain animals and plants the next time they came back (for tucker). It still happens (in a limited way) to this day in some areas.
The desert ecosystem has evloved to what we see today from the patch style burning.
There is a bit of research out there on
the desert ecosystems and their relationship to fire, and I don't think any of it suggests an large, intense bushfire is good for it - but I'm willing to listen if there is.
I enjoy having this sort of discussion open.
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Reply By: Member - Stephen L (SA) - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 13:05
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 13:05
Hi
We have just recently returned from some great areas in the
Gibson Desert - a truly great place. Along the Old Abandoned Section of the Gunbarrel, there were very large areas that had been burnt out, some only recently, as ash was still evident. Is this some of the large areas that had wildfires through. My group commented on how fierce the fires must have been. Were these fires caused by lightning strikes?
Cheers
Stephen
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Follow Up By: Department of Environment & Conservation (DEC) - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 15:46
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 15:46
About 95% of the large fires in that area are now created by lightning strikes. If you get a satellite image of the area you can usually pick out the finer mosaic around the communities and more commonly travelled roads from local aboriginal burning.
Last year about 5 main fires accounted for about 450,000ha. Including a large one east of the Patjarr turnoff on the Gunbarrel.
In 2000 about 5.6million ha burnt in the Gibson/
Warburton area over summer.
It can potentially sterilise the soil ans seed bank for a few years until recolonisation occurs.
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Follow Up By: Member - Stephen L (SA) - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 20:18
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 20:18
Thanks for your reply. I know where you are coming from and agree with what you are doing. People that have not been out there will not believe how the damage from the lightning strikes has cause such a large area to be burnt out. If the deserts were burnt off like they used to be managed by the Aboriginals, they would know that there is less damage to the landscape than after a build up of combustible materials. I am over 6' tall and in some sections where the spinifex has not been burnt for a number of years, I could just see over the tops of the spinifex flower stalks.
The below photo taken in the Northern Territory shows the effects of burning off, small clumps of spinifex that would not burn as bad as unburned spinifex like that in the front of my vehicle. We are back out that way again next year and should see the difference that your burning has done.
Keep up the great work.
Regards
StephenImage Could Not Be Found
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Reply By: Mike Harding - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 16:26
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 16:26
I commend you for posting to a
forum such as this. Many (most?) government departments would be fearful of doing so - they, frequently, seem to forget it is us they serve and not the other way round.
Mike Harding
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Reply By: S&N - Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 22:12
Friday, Aug 01, 2008 at 22:12
i also want to applaud the fact that you have posted info in a
forum like this. thank you very much. the only suggestion i would make is that next time you post a bit earlier, as 6 days notice is a little short, most people planning a log trip will have planned everything in advance of this info. i understand that you may not get prior warning either.....but its just a suggestion!
thanks again for the warning.
shannon
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