Victoria’s Mountain Ash forests can rival Californian Redwoods in size
So its a shame they’re being clearfelled for copy paper.
Arriving in Toolangi State Forest is a little overwhelming. The enormous Mountain Ash trees soar above, their canopies fifty to sixty metres from the ground. These are some of the smaller of the species.
The tallest living Eucalyptus Regnans stands at a hundred metres, in Tasmania. Historical records claim some of the biggest trees were anywhere from 115 to a staggering 135 metres tall when European loggers first arrived, rivalling the tallest tree in the world, a Californian Redwood. Although these claims are disputed, there are a great number of measurements in this range from the early days. The truth may not be known until these forests have been allowed to grow undisturbed for another several centuries.
You would be well justified in thinking these magnificent forests would be well protected. That the low secondary canopy of ancient tree ferns would be safe, and that the fresh water stored in the rich soils and slowly released into icily flowing crystal clear streams would be valued. Victoria’s critically endangered faunal emblem, the Leadbeaters possum, calls these forests home. You would imagine that it’s presence would make protection a mere formality, given the obvious need to preserve its remaining habitat.
Apparently not. Not only are these forests being progressively clearfelled, but the resulting piles of organic matter are being torched with petroleum based incendiaries, sterilising the soil in a blaze far more intense than any natural forest fire. We were shown a map of proposed logging coupes over the next three years. In some areas the forest would become wall-to-wall clearfell. This is despite it being an island of forest that escaped the devastation of the fires in 2009 while surrounding areas were incinerated. It’s not even a very successful business. The logging industry here is pumped up with subsidies, and is lucky to make a profit of $250 000 in a year. This destruction is being wrought simply in the wrongheaded support of a dying industry.
We visited one of the coupes. A long trek up a hill through a maze of tree ferns led us into a devastated clearing. Enormous stumps and shattered timber lay everywhere while the remains of tree ferns could be seen ground into the soil. The temperature soared as we stepped into the open, with the shading leaves and branches now strewn about our ankles. The wisdom of destroying our natural air conditioners in a warming world seems lax. We continued on and came across the logging machines. Giant yellow beasts with great claws and blades. A pile of eviscerated trunks sat next to them, poised above a dirt cliff gouged out of the hillside. The steep ground had been rent and torn by the machines, and piles of rich forest topsoil now stood ready to wash away in the incessant rains of Victoria.
Despite the claims of loggers of regenerative practices, it can take up to a century for adequately complex hollow bearing forest to form from a bare coupe like this. The image below shows twenty four years of regeneration, with the sign proudly declaring the regrowth. The uniform destruction rarely leaves any trees that can act as hollow bearing habitat in the future, and increasing pressure from warming temperatures and bushfires in the future may give the coup de grace to these forests and the animals that call them home. Only time will tell.
