Noongars Knew Best

David Ward
10th April 2005

Before Europeans arrived, Noongar people managed our south-west dry forests and woodlands very well without fire trucks, water bombers, helicopters, television journalists, concerned politicians, the Conservation Council, hundreds of firefighters, or the Salvation Army to give them all breakfast. They did this by burning frequently, in most places as often as it would carry a mild, creeping fire in summer.

Even where there were no Noongars, most of the bush would have burnt frequently by unimpeded lightning fires, trickling on for months. Such large lightning fires continued up to the 1920s, before there were any Bushfire Brigades, and before the Forests Department had developed fire fighting capacity. They could travel a hundred kilometres before autumn rain doused them. Much of the landscape would have burnt as often as it could carry a fire. Fire suppression and exclusion are new fangled human notions.

Frequent fire made the bush safe, and promoted grass for yonka (kangaroo), and a host of bush tucker plants. It produced byoo, the red fruit of the djiridji, or zamia. Frequent light smoke germinated seeds, and provoked flowering of kangaroo paws and balga grasstrees.

Kangaroo paws and byoo are increasingly rare, under an advocacy which claims that we should exclude fire from large bush areas for long periods. This phoney idea makes the bush very dangerous, as we saw last year at Karagullen, and before that at Mt. Cooke and Nuyt’s Wilderness. Fire cannot be excluded indefinitely, and the longer it has been absent, the fiercer, and more damaging it will be.

Some claim that, left alone, the litter will all rot down to enrich the soil. The truth, as any Perth Hills resident will testify, is that there is some decay in winter, but the summer blizzard of dead leaves, bark, and capsules is far greater, so litter builds up. After twenty years or so, there is a mulching effect, and build up ceases. However, by then most wildflowers are smothered and straggly, and most of the nutrient is locked up in dead matter. Frequent, mild fire releases the nutrients, sweetens the soil, and prunes the plants. Gardeners will appreciate that.

In the 1840s, the early West Australian botanist James Drummond wrote “When I was a sojourner in England, I never remember to have seen Australian plants in a good state after the second or third years and that, I think, is in a great degree owing to their not being cut down close to the ground when they begin to get ragged; how for the pruning knife and a mixture of wood ashes in the soil would answer as a substitute to the triennial or quaternal burnings they undergo in their native land, I am unable to say, some of our plants never flower in perfection but the season after the ground is burned over…” 1

There are many historical references to frequent, widespread burning by south-west Noongars. In 1837 Lt. Henry Bunbury mentioned “…the periodical extensive bush fires which, by destroying every two to three years the dead leaves, plants, sticks, fallen timber etc. prevent most effectually the accumulation of any decayed vegetable deposit… being the last month of summer … the Natives have burnt with fire much of the country…” 2

In 1975 Mr. Frank Thompson was interviewed about his memories of fire near the south coast, before the First World War. He said “You see, the Natives …they used to burn the country every three or four years…when it was burnt the grass grew and it was nice and fresh and the possums had something to live on and the kangaroos had something to live on and the wallabies and the tamars and boodie rat …It didn’t burn very fast because it was only grass and a few leaves here and there and it would burn ahead and…sometimes there’d be a little isolated patch of other stuff that wasn’t good enough to burn the time before, but as it burnt along perhaps there might be some wallabies or tamars …those animals didn’t run away from fire, they’d run up to it and you’d see them hopping along the edge of the fire until they saw a place where the fire wasn’t burning very fierce…” 3

It is hard to imagine wallabies hopping along the flame front of the recent Karragullen fire, looking for a way through. Long fire exclusion is causing fires of unprecedented ferocity, and many avoidable wildlife deaths. The longer fire has been excluded, the longer the bush takes to recover when it eventually, and inevitably, burns.

Under frequent, light burning, there would have been thousands of small refuges, in rocks or near creeks, which would have burnt less often, perhaps never. Recent fierce fires destroy these, and the fire sensitive plants and animals they protect. The advocacy of long fire exclusion over large areas destroys the refuges of the very plants and animals it claims to care for.

In some places two to four year burning continued until the First World War. In others, it continued up to the 1930s, and even the 1950s. Some old Perth Hills families remember when any fire could be put out with wet bags or green branches. This is only possible when fires are in litter no more than four years old, with flames less than a metre high.

Far from destroying diversity, this frequent burning enhanced it, by creating a rich mosaic of different aged patches. Animals had both food and shelter, and wildflowers flourished. Today’s  blanket fire exclusion in National Parks leads to an eventual single, blanket, fierce fire, which simplifies the ecosystem down to a single age. This is the likely outcome for Yalgorup National Park, where there has been little or no prescribed burning since 1960, when the park was established. Most of the remaining tuart trees will be killed outright, as will many equally old grasstrees. In my view, that park is a death trap in summer, since peppermint burns like napalm, and, last time I was there, there were few turn around points on the sandy tracks.

By insisting, through our political representatives, that CALM burn the bush more often, and more patchily, we will make it safer, see more wildflowers, avoid most animal deaths, and avoid dense, choking smoke from fierce wildfires. We will have to live with occasional light smoke from prescribed burns. If most litter were less than five years old, smoke would be minimal, and arson would be futile. All it could cause would be a mild, creeping fire, which would benefit the bush. Fire refuges would be protected.

Think of the savings and benefits by working with nature, instead of fighting it. No more squadrons of aircraft, anxious home owners, and choking smoke for a week or more. The police could get on with catching burglars. More young Noongar people should be employed by CALM to help manage the bush with fire, restoring their culture and healing their self esteem.

References

Thanks to Dr. Lachlan McCaw for this quote from Drummond’s letters at the WA Herbarium.
2 Thanks to Dr. Sylvia Hallam for this quote from her book ‘Fire & Hearth’.
3 Thanks to Dr. Ian Abbott for this quote from the Battye Library.