Two worlds colliding

20/2/2024

In 1980, Michael Hutchence of INXS sang the haunting lyric ‘Two worlds collided,’ in the song ‘Never Tear Us Apart.’ If you're over 45 you can probably hear his words because ‘you were there.’
It seems that many worlds are colliding right now and the ideals of Landcare are caught right in the middle.

From 'Two Worlds Colliding,' image - Csillag & Wainwright

The Regent Honeyeater, Xanthomyza phrygia, once numerous along the east coast, now number only 300 birds. Photo Tim Van Leeuwen

Conservation and commerce

The world of commerce has been colliding head-on with the world of conservation since Australia was first settled/invaded 250 years ago.

Bearing witness to this is our extraordinary loss of native flora and fauna, that appears to have been accepted as an unavoidable cost of the ‘healthy’ economic growth of a new nation.

PhD candidate Michelle Ward from Queensland University reminds us that we presently have 72 species of birds facing extinction. These include the Kangaroo Island Glossy Black Cockatoo, the Regent Honeyeater, and the Night Parrot which sadly has been reduced to only 150 birds.

Hopefully, we can prevent the names of these species from being added to the 29 birds known to have been lost since 1788.

It seems in the last two decades, governments at all levels have played down the urgency to protect our iconic plants and animals. The EPBC Act of 1999, Australia's main environmental law, has a woeful record of protecting our flora and fauna. As a conservationist, I’m hopeful that Labor’s new environment protection laws will have sharp enough teeth to prevent any further extinctions, as has been promised by the Minister for the Environment, Tanya Plibersek. (Tragically this legislation has now been delayed until a second term of the Labor Government. How many species will we lose while governments shelve these critical laws).

At a state level, the Victorian Auditor General's Office produced a scathing report in October 2021 called ‘Protecting Victoria’s Biodiversity.’ It found that;

‘DELWP’s cost-benefit approach can also miss endangered threatened species at extreme risk of extinction. Further, DELWP continues to make limited use of available legislative tools to protect threatened species.’

Young Australians do have fair cause to criticise the seeming half-hearted efforts of older generations to protect our wildlife heritage.

Please note: DWELP, The Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, is now DEECA, The Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action. Hopefully this flags a change in focus.

Traditional Owner burning in Cape York. Photo Dale Smithyman

Contemporary and Traditional

The world of Traditional Owner land management practice has collided with the world of contemporary land management in our parks and reserves. They were poles apart until the Black Summer bushfires of 2019. Then everyone began remembering that wildfires were rare in this country before the first fleet arrived in 1788.

With 75% of remnant vegetation sitting on private land, this collision of traditional and contemporary management practices has unearthed both an opportunity and a responsibility for all Australians.

It’s time that we acknowledge that we have amongst us representatives of an ancient culture that successfully preserved our plants and animals for millennia. We could benefit immeasurably from adopting many of their traditional management practices and their traditional philosophies of animism and inclusive conservation.

This is an urgent matter, because most of the remnant patches of native bush that support endangered wildlife are isolated and degraded. They no longer provide the complexity of habitat and the critical connections that wildlife need. The day-to-day management of private and public reserves needs to change to reflect the practices and knowledge gained over thousands of years by Traditional Owners.

Harvesting Blackwood (Acacia melanoxylon) seed is easy safe work. It's currently valued at over $300/kg

The need to make a connection

For most of the history of revegetation on farms, plantations were seen as a backdrop to essential farm income-generating activities. There is an unspoken philosophy of plant and forget, with plantations being seen as little more than beneficial add-ons to boundary fences. Rarely do landowners spend much time in their plantations unless there is a problem to fix.

Plantations on farms have the potential to be much more than windbreaks and shelter belts. They could protect biodiversity as well as be a dynamic source of food, medicines, timber products, cut flowers, seeds, essential oils and honey as potential harvests.

First Australians managed their lands to provide their food and medicines. They knew their country intimately and where to look for the resources they needed, they knew how to maintain them in good condition for future years how to keep their country safe from damaging wild-fires. They protected the natural resources because their future health and wellbeing depended on high levels of conservation.

I can imagine a future Australia, where landowners follow this example and connect with plantations both practically and emotionally. They will harvest the products they need to feed their families, provide materials for the farm, and to generate an income.

In a future Australia, landowners would also enjoy the wild environments they have created and played a part in restoring. They will witness the return of plants, animals, and insects that help to maintain an ecological balance on the farm. They will live in much safer rural communities where fire is far less of a summer threat.

A deeper connection with the plants and animals in a diverse natural landscape will help support human mental health

Plantations of the future

These future plantations will need to be wider and may occupy as much as 30% of rural properties. They will be frequently visited for harvesting and maintenance, as well as for leisure. The benefits to human mental health through a closer connection with nature are well documented.

Wildlife survival and a deeper connection

Wider plantations are also better suited to the spiral foraging patterns of wildlife and provide far more protection, critical to their survival.

A deeper connection with plants and animals in a diverse natural landscape will help support human health and provide Australian wildlife with a guaranteed future. We would become observers of the diversity of evolving ecologies in our own backyards as many worlds begin colliding.

In the words of American conservationist and philosopher Aldo Leopold;

‘When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.’

How to replant and restore the complex and interactive natural landscapes that wildlife need is the topic of this new book;

'Recreating the Country - Ten key principles for designing sustainable landscapes,' First published in 2009, expanded & updated in 2024.

This new edition provides easy-to-read, well researched articles on ecology and practical guidelines for restoring natural landscapes. 'Recreating the Country' is built on over 35 years of practical experience, observation and careful research.
Read more here

2 Comments

Peter O'Gorman

28/2/2024 04:01:32 pm

https://youtu.be/6S6i2Ay5tbk?si=NZRk-P_BNg_EeQ1U
Conference, Versailles Face au Climat 2023,. “Les Revolts du Ciel, Histoire Climatique” 15eme-21eme siècles par Fabien Locher et Jean Baptiste Ressau.

I followed the above link last year and thought that the conference sounded interesting enough to take a few notes. I mentioned some of the findings to Steve Murphy recently and he suggested that I make a resume of its contents as a blog that he might attach to one of his “Recreating the Country” blogs. While I apologise for all the errors that my translation may be riddled with, I also acknowledge that some observations recorded here are not endorsed by me. The book, Les Revolts du Ciel: une Histoire du Changement Climatique XV eme - XX eme by Jean Baptiste Fressoy and Fabien Locher is available on line although I have not seen any translation of it in English.

In 1820, The Institution Meteriologique de France in response to the discovery of a large file of documents discovered among the stack of the Ministry of the Interior, requested from all administrative departments of France, records regarding climatic and homotropic changes on climate that were evident in in the preceding thirty years . That is data regarding whether the weather was colder, wetter hotter and so on and whether there were more storms than usual and what changes that might be traced to human interference i.e. homotropic. The information gathered might show whether deforestation interfered with the water cycle as seemed to be the case in Nouvelle France i.e. 16th and 17th century French possessions in North America before they became British. References were noted in the writings of Jaques Cartier, Mark Escabot and Pere Bia.
Christopher Columbus’ son wrote a book in which he asserted that his father was convinced that manmade climatic changes existed.
17th Century French explorers set out with a specific cosmology in mind viz. the old Greek rendering of the world into climatic bands which occupied defined latitudes. The “best” climate being that of Athens, other climates might be called hot, cold, temperate or whatever. This being the case, the climate of La Rochelle should be the same as that of Montreal. However this is not the case! Quebec is colder than La Rochelle and this is due to deforestation in Europe, i.e. Europeans have changed their climate by cutting down trees. The native Canadians didn’t cut down trees, that is why it is colder there. The indigenous peoples did not exploit the territories and did not display any sovereignty over the land which was then designated “terra nullius” and “terra vacante”. Montesquieu alleged that climate creates our way of living (no reference given). Jean Baudin said that climate influences mores. (no reference given). In the 17th century Buffon iterates the same suggestion. In the 18th century books, notably by Pliads and Buffot noted the disappearance, in Nature’s kingdom, of animals as the climate cooled.
English writers, in the same period shared the same opinion that the Earth was cooling. The Earth was a piece of the Sun that since the fracture was cooling down. Indeed, man can improve his climate by deforestation. This was evident in the diminishing size of the North and South Poles. Civilization has an obligation to deforest to improve the climate. In 1780, the debate oscillated for and against the theory when data from The Antilles and New France (Mauritius) were recorded as being warmer than they might have been had not sugar production required deforestation, both in its cultivation and production.
Pierre Pourre set out for Martinique in the 1760s and in 1767 he noted that people chop down trees to make their fortune and in so doing leave arid lands abandoned to any exploitation behind them. The forests which once captured water and formed clouds are no longer available. In 1784, he returned to France to the breakdown of traditional care of forests and their management and he cited non-ecological evidence, particularly economic losses such as the diminution of taxes on activities like winemaking which was no longer being maintained in areas where previously it had been collected. This evidence was the basis of an energy crisis in France and it was displayed in the availability and cost of wood for domestic and industrial uses.
In 1760, man-made causes of climate change had been established in France, the fragility of nature was stressed rather together with its exploitation, deforestation resulted in a warmer climate and the interdependence between the two was reflected in the water cycle. Interference with the natural water cycle was the cause of the change.
In 1784, he returned to France and noticed there was an “energy crisis” there which was evident in the rising cost of wood, he applied his observations made in Martinique to the problem, viz. deforestation results in climate cha

Steve

3/3/2024 12:35:03 pm

Thanks Peter,
It’s sobering to think that nearly 300 years ago people were aware that clearing forests changed the climate and were warning against further clearing. The signs are much clearer today than ever before, but most of society seems to be choosing to look the other way.

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