Department of Social Sciences Faculty of Humanities People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong: The Landscape Ecology of a West Australian Water Catchment David Jefford Ward This thesis is presented for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy of Curtin University of Technology June 2010 People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 Declaration To the best of my knowledge and belief this thesis contains no material previously published by any other person except where due acknowledgment has been made. This thesis contains no material which has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university. Signature:…………………………………………. 1st. June 2010 Postal address: 2a, Dreyer Road, Roleystone, Western Australia 6111 Telephone: (08) 9397 5684 Email address: [email protected] i People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 Contents Pages i Declaration ii Contents iii Dedication iv Acknowledgements v Abstract 1 Chapter 1: Mudpies, Hypotheses, and Structure. 14 Chapter 2: Dodging Disciplines. 41 Chapter 3: About Wungong Catchment. 63 Chapter 4: The Other Side of the Hill. 87 Chapter 5: Bushfire, Flogging, Measles, and Foresters. 122 Chapter 6: Better to Believe the Balga. 145 Chapter 7: Does God Play Dice? 164 Chapter 8: Violins and Bidi Burning. 173 Chapter 9: Fire, Forest, and Water. 185 Chapter 10: All the World’s a Stage. 197 Chapter 11: Summing Up and Verdict. 208 Appendices 239 References ii People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 Dedication I dedicate this work to my beloved wife, Yvonne, for her patience, over many years, with my bushfire obsession. I’m not a pyromaniac, honest. I also dedicate it to my fire-fighting friends in the Volunteer Bushfire Brigades, the Forest Products Commission, and the Fire Management Branch of the Department of Environment and Conservation. They are the ones who actually have to ‘put the wet stuff on the red stuff’. It is hot, gritty, smoky work. iii People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 Acknowledgements I acknowledge the help and support of a number of people and organisations. Firstly I thank my supervisors, Professor Roy Jones, Associate Professor Alan Pilgrim, and Professor Lou Caccetta, all of Curtin University. Professor Jones was most prompt and efficient with both administrative and academic support; Professor Caccetta gave me the benefit of his understanding of mathematical Graph Theory; and Associate Professor Pilgrim showed interest in landscape fire. Two overseas academics have generously contributed useful information on both fire and soil. They are Assistant Professor Charles Kay, of Utah State University, and Professor William I. Woods, of the University of Kansas. I thank Mr. Frank Batini, Forest Consultant, and Dr. Colin Terry, formerly of the West Australian Water Corporation, for first offering me the opportunity to study Wungong Catchment. Dr. Terry returned to Tasmania in 2006, and his place as Project Manager, Corporate Business Development Branch was ably filled by Mr. Chris Botica, who has helped in various ways. Dr. Bishnu Devkota, Senior Engineer, Infrastructure Planning Branch has also helped with information, especially maps. I thank the Water Corporation of Western Australia for supply of equipment, such as a GPS, an EPIRB, and a mountain bike as non-polluting transport. Mr. Jeff Doust, Ms. Annie Sanderson, and Mr. Roger Partington of the Water Corporation Depot at Kelmscott also helped with permits and gate keys, with a minimum of red tape. I thank Rangers Terry Titshall and Denis Lutz for their friendly help and advice within the catchment, and interesting discussions on many topics from snakebite to feral pumas. More recently, Mr. Michael Loh has helped with further maps of the Wungong Catchment, and with equipment matters. I also thank Dr. Ian Colquhoun, and his employer, Alcoa of Australia, for funding a small generator, and the laptop computer on which this thesis was written. I am slightly less enthusiastic about their mining rehabilitation in the catchment. I still bear the scars from giant prickle bushes. Perhaps Alcoa can plead unwise advice from an employee of the former Forests Department. Finally, I thank all officers of the West Australian Department of Environment and Conservation for their help with various permits and permissions, especially Mr. Greg Standing of Jarrahdale. The DEC librarian at Como, Ms. Deborah Hardie, was unfailingly helpful. Dr. Ian Abbott, of the West Australian Department of Environment and Conservation, kindly read, and commented on, some of my musings. He also contributed some data. iv People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 Abstract Bushfire is, in terms of human lives lost, property destroyed, and damage to natural systems, by far the most urgent environmental problem in Australia. This thesis tries to answer a number of questions about bushfire behaviour, history, effects, and management, in the Wungong Catchment of Western Australia. It does so by an overtly cross-disciplinary approach, involving a mixture of the three main streams of human knowledge, namely the humanities, natural science, and social science. First, I offer a literature review of several hundred books and papers drawn from the three main streams of knowledge mentioned above. The review includes some discussion of ‘bushfire epistemology’, a currently vague and neglected matter. The concept of ‘place’ is important to humans, so I then give a straightforward geographical description of Wungong Catchment, with some mention of the history of bushfire. To describe the vegetation, I use inductive statistics, and a method developed by me from the ideas of Delaunay (1929) and Dirichlet (1850). Given that there are hundreds of plant species within the catchment, I use a landscape approach, and only sketch the main tree species, and two iconic plants, the balga and the djiridji, both of which are important to the original custodians of the catchment, the Nyoongar people. There is discussion of other people’s research into the effect of bushfire on seed banks, and the flowering intervals of some plants of the jarrah forest. To see if Western Australia is anomalous, or fits into the worldwide pattern of humans using fire as a landscape management tool, I then examine some records of bushfire in other lands, including Africa, Madagascar, India, and Europe. The thesis then looks at the history of fire in the jarrah forest of Western Australia, based on observations by early European explorers and settlers from 1826 onward, the views of various foresters, and some opinions of current Nyoongar Elders. Using a mixture of natural science, applied mathematics, and archaeology, I give the results of cleaning the stems of those ancient plants called grasstrees, or balga v People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 (Xanthorrhoea spp.). These carry the marks of former bushfires, stretching back to 1750. They confirm historical reports of frequent fire in the jarrah forest, at 2-4 year intervals, and a recent decline in fire frequency. This contradicts the view, held by some, that European arrival increased the frequency of fire. As support for the balga findings, I present a simple mathematical model of self- organization in bushfire mosaics. It shows how lengthy bushfire exclusion can lead to disastrous situations, in which large areas of landscape become flammable and unstable. It shows how frequent, patchy burning can maintain a stable bushfire mosaic, with mild, beneficial fires. In the next chapter, I offer mathematical suggestions on how current unstable mosaics can be restabilized, by careful reintroduction of such burning. In dry, south-western Australia, water supply is an important topic, and a better understanding of the hydrological effects of bushfire may help with both bushfire and water management. I draw upon the natural science of forest hydrology, and the effects of fire in catchments. The evidence comes not only from Australia, but also from the United States, and South Africa. Turning to social science, I introduce Professor Peter Checkland’s ‘Soft Systems Methodology’, and suggest how it could be applied in resolving complicated conflict about bushfire management. I finish in legal style, with a summing up, and a verdict on the use of bushfire as a land management tool in Wungong Catchment, and possibly in other flammable landscapes. -oOo- vi People, Fire, Forest and Water in Wungong Catchment – David Ward 2010 Chapter 1 Mudpies, Hypotheses, and Structure AN INTRODUCTION TO THE THESIS All the genuine, deep delight of life is in showing people the mud-pies you have made; and life is at its best when we confidingly recommend our mud-pies to each other’s sympathetic consideration. J.M. Thorburn, Art and the Unconscious, 1925. Preamble Although my background lies largely in natural science, this thesis is not entirely scientific, but cross-disciplinary, calling on natural science, social science, and the humanities, in an attempt to understand landscape fire behaviour, history, and ecology, in a place called Wungong Catchment, in south-western Australia. The common Australian (and African) term ‘bushfire’ is used throughout this thesis to mean fire in quasi-natural landscapes, as opposed to domestic, agricultural, or industrial fires. In North America the term ‘wildland fire’ is often used. The term ‘jungle fire’ has been used in India. Bushfire has both quantitative, and qualitative aspects, and our knowledge of it can be enhanced by both the hard-edged, experimental approach of science, and the softer, more speculative approach of the humanities. Bushfire affects both nature and human society. In such a complex mix, there is a need for clarity. I am an ecologist, and this thesis involves ecology, yet I intensely dislike the ugly, obscure language that is found in some papers on ecology. An eminent authority on plain language, Sir Ernest Gowers, once gave the classic example of a forty-one word paragraph, from a refereed and published ecological paper, which seems to say that animals move about more than plants, and, after moving, are no longer in the same place (Gowers 1973).