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Environment, news, culture from the Australian Alps

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Cam Walker

I work with Friends of the Earth, and live in Castlemaine in Central Victoria, Australia. Activist, mountain enthusiast, telemark skier, volunteer firefighter.

more private development in Tasmanian World Heritage Area ?

As the Tasmanian and federal governments are being internationally criticised at the World Heritage Commission meeting in Doha over their attempt to de-list 74,000 hectares of forest from the Tasmanian World Heritage Area, a new threat to the integrity of Tasmania’s reserves has come to light.

A Tasmanian government website is calling for Expressions of Interest from investors w ho have “ideas (for development) in the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area as well as our National Parks and Reserves”.

It says the government wants to “unlock its natural areas to allow exciting new tourism experiences that are complemented by sensitive and appropriate tourism infrastructure”. In other words, more private development in conservation reserves.

Specifically, it says that the Government is looking for “developments which broaden the range of exciting and unique experiences on offer in our state by improving access for tourists while maintaining the integrity of our natural areas”.

It suggests that “sensible and appropriate” developments in the Wilderness World Heritage Area, National Parks and Reserves might include “resort-style accommodation. It might include walking tours, helicopter flights, mountain-bike riding, river cruises, new interpretative experiences or even luxury camping escapes”.

The Government is initially looking for ideas for the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area as well as our National Parks and Reserves. In the longer term it will consider other protected areas including Crown land and State Forests.

The first round for putting in an EOI is open until 21 November 2014.

With the anti-green agenda of the Tasmanian government it is very hard not to see this as a dangerous development which will undermine the ecological integrity of the reserve system.

The Greens have opposed this process. Greens’ Parks and Tourism spokesperson Nick McKim said in May that “the Liberals have an irrational and ideological desire for development at any cost, and they simply cannot be trusted to safeguard the natural and cultural values of Tasmania’s National Parks.”

 

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The High Country of the Mind

The places we love are the ‘mountains of the mind’. The places we imagine and day-dream about. The places we escape to. Each of us has our special place. Some of us have many. Some just like to keep moving, and the mountain of the mind is the next unclimbed range.

What makes our places special? And what do we find there?

And where are your places?

Check here for some reflections, inspired by writer David Gilligan.

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Winter. Are we there yet?

It’s almost mid June and we’re still waiting for winter to start!

Forecasts have been all over the place. Recently the Climate Council suggested winter would be warmer than normal. Not good news for snow lovers.

Earlier reports on this site quoted weather guru grasshopper as predicting ‘a mediocre to above average season’.

With the BOM now suggesting the expected El Nino event will not occur until early spring, perhaps things are looking up.

According to the Weekly Times:

Weather forecasters at the Bureau of Meteorology last week dramatically downgraded the fears of El Nino’s drying influence on the weather in southern Australia this year.

While the El Nino pattern could still form in spring, the conditions that originally caused scientists to issue the warning disappeared last month.

Falls Creek is especially brave with this recent prediction:

Like many on the mountain, we’re beginning to get a very good feeling about this Winter. Old hands say it feels a lot like 1991, the end of the last Cold War, when our dear frenemy El Nino looked like a double agent early on before confounding the pundits and pounding us with record snowfalls. The pattern looks encouragingly familiar this year. Fingers crossed.

 

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In praise of the ephemeral

In my teenage years, after I became obsessed with all things alpine, I discovered the work of a number of ‘70s era nature photographers who were working on the micro scale in black and white.

snow3I found a number of large format photo books that gave me an insight into the small places and ephemeral beauty of ice and snow, wind blown sand and leaf fall.

snow5I followed their lead and spent endless hours looking downwards to the tiny worlds under our feet. One July, on a week long ski tour of the Bogong High Plains, I found myself camped near Johnston Hut, with an entire day to enjoy my birthday as I wandered amongst snow drifts and emerging poa tussocks, amongst stately snow gums as high ragged clouds pushed through, with the promise of fresh snow.

As I lent in to hear the small, and glean something from the temporary and incredibly complex tangle of the worlds at ground level, I was struck by a sense of wonder, of specialness, of amazing things happening just beyond our sight. I felt richness stitched into the complexity of thick tangles of grass, of bark thrown on snow, and bare branches against a pale, rich winter sky.

snow11As we wait for the decent falls of a late coming winter, I have been struck by that same old sense of wonder at the beauty of the ephemera of wind blown grass, stone and snow.

The following are some pics from Mt Hotham and nearby hills over Opening weekend 2014.

snow12

Little Higginbotham
Little Higginbotham

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Alpine park grazing challenged

The following comes from the Victorian National Parks Association,:

Wonnangatta River
Wonnangatta River

Today we took the first steps in our legal challenge against Alpine cattle grazing.

This case marks the first time in our 60 year history that the Victorian National Parks Association has taken the extraordinary step of launching court proceedings to protect national parks – the cornerstone of our conservation efforts – from damaging cattle grazing. 
Represented by Environmental Justice Australia and barristers Richard Niall QC and Andrew Walker, we headed to the Supreme Court of Victoria for a directions hearing on the case. The court set a time in early July 2014 for a further hearing. 
According to Felicity Millner, Director of Litigation at Environmental Justice Australia and part of our legal team, today’s hearing takes us one step closer to getting a decision from the court about whether it is legal for the government to put cattle in the national park. 
At the final hearing of the case, we will be arguing the laws do not allow cattle in the Alpine National Park. 
Ensuring the integrity of national parks is an investment in the future. Whether we win or lose this legal test case, the idea and importance of national parks as a haven for people and nature must be defended.
To fight this campaign we need to raise money from visionary people in Victoria. We are hoping you are one of those people. 
We have to take this legal action now.  In March this year, 60 cattle were rushed back into the Wonnangatta Valley, part of the heritage-listed Alpine National Park, under a flawed fire management trial by the Napthine Government.
The cattle have now left, but will be back next summer, when up to 300 head of cattle will do even more damage.
These ‘cattle grazing trials’ have been roundly criticised as flawed science that will contribute little, if anything, to our understanding of fire management. The evidence speaks for itself, you can read all about it on our website.
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warmer weather, shorter ski season?

The most recent assessment of Australian weather trends (seasonal update: abnormal autumn 2014) from the Climate Council warns of a warmer than average winter. Professor Will Steffen says that “warmer weather increases the odds that the ski season will be shorter”.

“The unseasonably warm conditions that many regions of Australia experienced in April and May are likely to continue through winter. Higher-than-average maximum and minimum temperatures are likely over most of the country with the chances of warmer-than-average conditions being particularly high for the southern half of the continent.

With a warmer winter on the cards this year, the prospect of increasing intensity and frequency of winter warm spells could lengthen Australia’s bushfire season and worsen drought conditions”.

As skiers and boarders will remember from last winter, when overall temperatures are warmer than usual, it doesn’t take much to lose snow base when there are precipitation events. Victoria was especially hard hit last year, with loss of the entire base in July after a reasonable start to the winter in June.

The good news is that we can do something about this if we choose to do so:

“These trends can be turned around. Australians have an opportunity to rapidly and significantly reduce our CO2 emissions to help stabilise the climate and halt the current trend towards more extreme weather events and hotter average temperatures”.

 

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Australian backcountry film festival – Spring 2014

For the past four years, the backcountry film festival has been attracting good numbers of people and is showing in more locations.

It seems like it might be time to have our own festival – with films made in Australia.

At previous Melbourne shows, we have added a film about skiing and boarding on The Bluff, and this year saw OFF GRID, a new effort on Mt Bogong from SoO Airtime.

The plan is to hold an Australian backcountry film festival in late spring 2014 with only local content. There are some fantastic film makers out there, and we hope to be able to showcase some of these.

We are seeking expressions of interest from film makers who would like to submit films.

Any human and gravity powered backcountry adventure would be welcome: walking, skiing, boarding, MTBing, paddling, climbing, …

As this is an entirely volunteer effort, with no budget, we are not able to offer payment for showing the films.

Films can be in two length categories. We hope to show an hours worth of short films (3 to 7 minutes) then up to 2 longer films (30 – 40 minutes).

At this point we are looking at doing a Melbourne showing, with the ability to offer the festival to other places once its packaged up.

If you’re keen, please get in touch: cam.walker@foe.org.au

And get out there and getting filming!

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Introducing The Watershed

6a00d8341d07fd53ef01a3fd06febb970b-500wiAs we wait patiently for cooler weather and serious snow falls, you may enjoy this one. Its the pilot issue of a newsprint publication.

The previous one focused on all things snow and was called The Drift.

The Watershed is a collaborative newsprint publication between The Usual (‘The Usual is a creative team with a penchant for the outdoors’) and Patagonia to celebrate the joy of simple fly fishing, healthy rivers, dam busting, and sustainably sourced food.

The Watershed features Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard, Patagonia fly fishing ambassador April Vokey, DamNation producer Matt Stoecker, director Travis Rummel, 1% for the Planet co-founder Craig Mathews, dam buster Katie Lee. With contributions by Malcolm Johnson, Jeremy Koreski, Paul Greenberg, Jeanine Pesce, Keith Malloy, Trevor Gordon, Stefan Knecht, Jim Mangan, and others.

Pick up your  Spring/Summer 2014 copy at select Patagonia stores worldwide.

You can read it here.

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Perisher Peak Festival

a1June 6 – 9

The Perisher Valley in NSW’s Snowy Mountains will open the 2014 Australian Winter Ski Season with a vibrant 4 day festival packed with live music at the snow over the June long weekend.

From the organisers:

“The 6th Perisher Snowy Mountains of Music-Peak Festival will run from Friday 6th June to Monday 9th June 2014 and is presented by the Perisher Resorts Chamber of Commerce and led by veteran musician David De Santi who has been the Artistic Director of the famed Illawarra Folk Festival since 1996 and is a member of one of Australia’s most famous bush bands, Wongawilli. With Dave De Santi at the helm you can expect to hear some great new sounds from here and overseas and walk away with an experience to remember. Read more about David here.

This is your opportunity to soak up the magic of the snow fields whilst listening to some of our best musicians step up to the mic with a mix of world, folk, roots, celtic, acoustic, traditional music, song, dance, poetry and yarnspinning. Peak will take place across 8 indoor venues in Perisher Valley, Smiggin Holes and Guthega Alpine Village”.

Full details here.

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Leaves From An Australian Forest Protest

Ron coverIn the late 1980’s the campaign to save the majestic forests of the South East New South Wales hinged on a Base Camp set up at Reedy Creek to provide a jumping off point for Direct Action.

The forest protests were having limited effect and getting very little media. Late one night, around the campfire, a small group of greenies discussed their ’perfect’ action. It turned out that each of us dreamed the same dream; getting away from the mass arrest protests of the day where people simply presented themselves en-mass for arrest and moving up into the trees where the Police couldn’t reach us and staying there – that is how the first long-term tree action on mainland Australia was born.

This is a poetic memoir of the actions that followed by Ron Fletcher, who was a central figure in the campaign. As Ron notes “while much of those forests has since been sacrificed to the wood chippers greed, the spirit and skills developed through Nullica and subsequent SE forest protests continued and grew to be followed by many powerful platform protests and protestors”.

You can read a review and order the book here.

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Alpine grazing. It’s not just a bumper sticker, it’s a hypothesis

fire damage on Great Alpine Road
fire damage on Great Alpine Road

Its just not a credible one.

Latrobe University recently hosted a significant event organised by the Research Centre for Applied Alpine Ecology on the much contested topic of alpine grazing and whether it is a useful management tool to reduce fire intensity.

It featured two researchers with long term research backgrounds in the realm of fire and grazing.

A report is available here.

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OFF GRID – backcountry skiing on Mt Bogong

“In 2012 seven adventurous skiers explored the Australian High Country. They camped, skied and filmed across one week’.

This short film is the result. Focused on the experience of climbing and riding on Mt Bogong and its ‘camo snow’, OFF GRID is a celebration of Australian backcountry skiing and boarding.

OFF GRID was produced by Joey Corcoran and Watkin McLennan of SoO Airtime (“a movie, an event, a community and bunch of Australian skiers that love sharing their Airtime”).

It premiered at the Melbourne showing of the Backcountry film festival in May 2014.

You can see it here.

Find Soo Airtime on Facebook.

 

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