Bushfire season 2019-2020

[north-north-west]

That might work in certain areas, but you cant cut-and-paste that approach across different landscapes and vegetation types.

The problem is that it was a very complex set of burning regimens, each one adapted for different species, different ecosystems, different locations and different climates. And unfortunately much of the local knowledge has been lost. But with fire scientists and traditional owners working together to combine and extend knowledge, much of it can be rebuilt - in time. Second part of the problem - assuming will and funding, do we have enough time?

[potato]

That might work in certain areas, but you cant cut-and-paste that approach across different landscapes and vegetation types.

The problem is that it was a very complex set of burning regimens, each one adapted for different species, different ecosystems, different locations and different climates. And unfortunately much of the local knowledge has been lost. But with fire scientists and traditional owners working together to combine and extend knowledge, much of it can be rebuilt - in time. Second part of the problem - assuming will and funding, do we have enough time?

More complex than most can appreciate. Yes much of the knowledge in the eastern states has been lost but I do know of some scientists working with communities to rebuild some of this knowledge.

However in the climate regime where we are experiencing more frequent catastrophic conditions, we are in world where even the traditional methods hazard reduction wont have much of an impact on large landscape fires. What you do on the ground under these scenarios has zero impact on an intense canopy fire.

[Moondog55]

Cutting mile wide firebreaks though some of our terrain is a big ask but perhaps that is what we may need to look at, then we could burn the firebreak every few years.

[potato]

https://theconversation.com/a-surprisin ... ire-127022

[wildwanderer]

https://theconversation.com/a-surprising-answer-to-a-hot-question-controlled-burns-often-fail-to-slow-a-bushfire-127022

Yep and what’s worse it all grows back in a year or two with often denser undergrowth! Unless a bushfire happens in that exact spot within 12 months, there is no reduction in risk. Scomo and the like don’t really care about reducing public risk from fire in a meaningful way.. See how they have ignored experienced senior fire chiefs desperate pleas for more equipment... https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-14/ ... g/11705330

They do care about being seen to be doing something... and everyone sees and breathes in smoke from a hazard reduction burn!

[potato]

https://theconversation.com/a-surprising-answer-to-a-hot-question-controlled-burns-often-fail-to-slow-a-bushfire-127022

Yep and what’s worse it all grows back in a year or two with often denser undergrowth!

It's not uncommon for a fire to burn over the same spot twice during the same event or season, particularly in regions with mountainous terrain.

[north-north-west]

Cutting mile wide firebreaks though some of our terrain is a big ask but perhaps that is what we may need to look at, then we could burn the firebreak every few years.

Further fragmenting habitat and increasing stress on already vulnerable wildlife and ecosystems.

It's not that simple. People keep looking for quick and easy fixes, but there aren't any. We have to adjust and adapt and invent different ways of doing just about everything.

[Moondog55]

Mile wide firebreaks are a far from simple solution and it would only be a small part of the overall fix.
We desperately need to get more water stored in the ground and stop the deforestation of the country as well as not taking more water from the system than exists as that very small surplus in most seasons. We've know since the 1950's what to do, we just have never had the political or social will to do it. I once shared a bottle of port with a very senior public servant who had just quit his job in disgust over forest and environmental mismanagement and who gave me some real insight into how big the problem is but how simple in principal the fix is, simple but very very costly
In his opinion but he made a lot of sense

[north-north-west]

Regenerative agriculture should be a major part of it. But mile-wide firebreaks? Around how large a parcel of land? Around which parcels of land? Are they supposed to be totally bare? Because that just means more ground that isn't growing anything and is effectively dead - minimal water retention, erosion, etc. What sort of a result are you after?

It. Isn't. Simple. Ecology is complex. Climate is complex. Human intervention makes systems even more complex. Listen to people like David Bowman. He's spent a lifetime studying this.

[rcaffin]

Cutting mile wide firebreaks though some of our terrain is a big ask but perhaps that is what we may need to look at, then we could burn the firebreak every few years.

Perhaps removing every bit of combustible material over the whole of Australia? That would work (I think).

Reminds me of the Roads and Traffic Authority motto: One World, One People, One Asphalt.

Cheers
Roger

[highercountry]

A fire break does diddly squat against a fire spotting 15 km's ahead of the front.
I heard a figure of spot fires breaking out 18 km's ahead of one of the current NSW fires.
In those types of conditions controlled, hazard reduction burning achieves very little, if anything.
We have entered an entirely new era of wildfire the first of which was 2003.
Our governments have had decades of warning, 16 years of "proof" and done FA.

[Moondog55]

We can put out spot fires, we have helicopters and water bombers.

[mandragara]

How long does it take the bush to recover from big burns like this? Are half of NSW's national parks going to be burnt out wastelands for the next few years?

[Neo]

I think the will be some interest in visiting a spot a few times to see the initial regrowth.

Extra hot fires are a problem for plants, and repeated incidents that don't allow time for seeds to grow into mature plants.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-09-18/ ... RI2BzM2RAg

[Warin]

If caught early, say in a residential environment, spot fires can be extinguished by a local resident with a bucket of water. Difficulties arise where the sport fire starts, say in bushland, and enlarges before being noticed.

[north-north-west]

If caught early, say in a residential environment, spot fires can be extinguished by a local resident with a bucket of water. Difficulties arise where the sport fire starts, say in bushland, and enlarges before being noticed.

Don't know how much actual experience the armchair experts have, but...as a nine year old I was part of the bucket-and-gunny-sack brigade in '67. Not my first experience of bushfires, and a long way from being the last. This attitude of "locals with buckets of water" is fine if you have enough people who know what they're doing, who are equipped and observing every inch of ground in the potential spot fire area. When embers are being blown 15-20km ahead of a 100km front, that's a lot of country and a lot of people.

[Warin]

This attitude of "locals with buckets of water" is fine if you have enough people who know what they're doing, who are equipped and observing every inch of ground in the potential spot fire area.

When I had burnt black leaves falling out of the sky onto my place, myself and may neighbours did not get much (any) sleep and had buckets of water scattered around ready for use. Past experience has lead me not to trust mains water supply.

[ofuros]

Qld. Thick smoke blanketed the Main Range NP from Mt Lindesay to Cunningham's Gap this morning...very eerie not seeing that jagged ridgeline on the horizon.

Couple of spot fires still burning on the steep sections of Minnage Mt around Burnett Creek & on the flanks of Bell Mt too. Hot, dry & charred landscape. Oven-like 38° around Boonah.

Mt Lindsay highway from Rathdowney to Woodenbong was also closed this morning, due to the fire & thick smoke.

Crossing my fingers for early monsoon rains hasn't worked.

[Warin]

How long does it take the bush to recover from big burns like this? Are half of NSW's national parks going to be burnt out wastelands for the next few years?

Not long for the gums to re-sprout. You want to get to these sites fairly quickly if you want to 'see' the place totally blackened. Then a mouth or three latter there will be green sprouts blocking the previous views.

[tastrax]

Crossing my fingers for early monsoon rains hasn't worked.

Try thoughts and prayers.....

[ofuros]

Rain dancing like no ones watching, didn't work either.

[Hughmac]

As a botanist I believe prescribed burning to be of little or no benefit in fire management in Australian forests. Firstly, one of the consequences of these burns is simply to produce a new fuel load of scorched, dead eucalyptus leaves, branches and dead trees. Secondly, repeated burning changes the plant community to pyrophilous species that burn more readily than a stable, long term established plant community. The whole concept of controlled burns arose from the Stretton royal commission into the 1939 fires in Victoria - 'Black Friday'. It was basically just a continuation of the settlers approach to forest 'management', adopted in hope more than anything. Since then it has become an established practice, but to my knowledge there is still little evidence to support its effectiveness. Given the health impacts listed elsewhere in this discussion, and the damage done by 'controlled' burns which aren't, their value is highly questionable. A serious forest fire in Australia is more than capable of propagating itself with a minimum of apparent fuel - they are so hot they simply volatilise organic matter, creating flammable gasses. This is how they propagate across apparently bare paddocks.

[Hughmac]

How long does it take the bush to recover from big burns like this? Are half of NSW's national parks going to be burnt out wastelands for the next few years?

Not long for the gums to re-sprout. You want to get to these sites fairly quickly if you want to 'see' the place totally blackened. Then a mouth or three latter there will be green sprouts blocking the previous views.

The eucalypts will come back reasonably quickly, but the understory will probably be dominated by acacias for quite a while. These forests exhibit a clear succession of different plants as they recover from fire.
Different story for the rainforests that have burnt - very good chance they will never recover. They are simply not adapted to fire, and are often replaced by eucalypt forest after fire.

[mandragara]

Thanks for the info.

I'd be interested to see an area totally blackened, for example Crawfords Lookout. But my main concern is damaging an area that's regenerating by walking through it. Guess it's best to stick to well defined tracks in these areas for a while.

How long does it take the bush to recover from big burns like this? Are half of NSW's national parks going to be burnt out wastelands for the next few years?

Different story for the rainforests that have burnt - very good chance they will never recover. They are simply not adapted to fire, and are often replaced by eucalypt forest after fire.

Shame to hear about the rainforests. I really like Werrikimbe NP, especially the Cobcroft area. I'd be really, really sad if that rainforest was destroyed.

[Warin]

Thanks for the info.

I'd be interested to see an area totally blackened, for example Crawfords Lookout. But my main concern is damaging an area that's regenerating by walking through it. Guess it's best to stick to well defined tracks in these areas for a while.

How long does it take the bush to recover from big burns like this? Are half of NSW's national parks going to be burnt out wastelands for the next few years?

Different story for the rainforests that have burnt - very good chance they will never recover. They are simply not adapted to fire, and are often replaced by eucalypt forest after fire.

Shame to hear about the rainforests. I really like Werrikimbe NP, especially the Cobcroft area. I'd be really, really sad if that rainforest was destroyed.

You got the quote wrong - Hughmac not Warin. And yes - stick to well worn tracks. The burnt trees can be weakened and fall without warning. I have stuck to fire trails and other roads. Once they have had some time and hopefully some winds through them then smaller paths. It is interesting to see life come back, take photos.

[LachlanB]

How long does it take the bush to recover from big burns like this? Are half of NSW's national parks going to be burnt out wastelands for the next few years?

Michael Doherty has done some excellent research using vegetation surveys to answer this question around Canberra following the massive 2003 fires. If anyone's interested I can try and track it down- bits and pieces are available online, but I'm not sure how much. I know he's been taking regular series of photos of his many points, so you can visibly see the vegetation changes.

Basically, the Eucalypts will probably be fine, they'll just take a while to grow back from epicormic buds, and there'll likely be a flush shrubs that respond to fire in the meantime. Unless they're one of the species of Eucalypts that only regenerate from seed after fires (obligate re-seeders), in which case, they'll probably be fine, but have to grow back from seed and take decades to return to their former state. However, if there's another fire before the re-seeders reach maturity, they'll all be killed and not grow back on a landscape scale. Also unless the fire was very intense, at which point all the Eucs have to grow back from seed or lignotubers.

The rainforest very much depends on how intense the fire was locally, and how damp the rainforest was when it burnt. Even the big, very hot fires can have a surprising degree of spatial variability in how intensely it burns a given patch of (rain)forest. Some of it will be stuffed, and replaced with wet sclerophyll forest tho, and then, if that isn't burnt for 500 years or so, it might transition back into rainforest. Hopefully most of it will be ok tho!

[ghosta]

Your post does illustrate the challenge ahead for fire management authorities..climate change deniers and now prescibed burning deniers. Both ignore throroughly proven science. While climate change deniers can to a degree be excused because climate is ever changing and trends are not always observable, the effects of prescribed burning can so easily be seen that a child can see and understand why they help control wildfire.

[mandragara]

Very interesting!

We will just have to wait and see. Fingers crossed!

[rcaffin]

the effects of prescribed burning can so easily be seen that a child can see and understand why they help control wildfire.
I will rise to the challenge. I suggest that this is actually totally false.
By and large, even a child can see that 'controlled burning' does NOT reduce any fire risk: it just creates more dead fuel each time. It does happen that an area will be burnt, and then burnt again a few months later.
In addition, the smoke from 'controlled burns' puts many people in hospital and does cause some people to die.
Finally, it trashes the bush and creates real hardships for our native animals, as well as threatening the survival of many endangered species.

FYI: I was a member of our local bushfire brigade for many years.We find that other methods of protection are more effective around our farm, especially maintaining an open fire break (mowing) and manual clearing of fuel load. Sadly, some of our neighbours are not willing to do this work for themselves.

Insurance companies will not insure properties built in known flood zones. Very sensible. I suspect that they will sooner or later move to decline insurance for cases where the property owner has not taken precautions against fire. After all, why should I pay for other people's laziness?

Cheers
Roger

[Warin]

Insurance companies will not insure properties built in known flood zones. Very sensible. I suspect that they will sooner or later move to decline insurance for cases where the property owner has not taken precautions against fire. After all, why should I pay for other people's laziness?

The insurance companies are or will be looking at that.

My and my neighbours problem is that the neighbouring national park will not take those precautions against fire - no manpower, no funding and politics.