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Mountain Journal

Environment, news, culture from the Australian Alps

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Climate change, fire and mountain environments

We know that climate change is already impacting on the Australian Alps. Declining snow pack, hotter summers, and longer fire seasons are just some of the impacts we are seeing. This brings many challenges to land managers, and is changing the mountain landscapes we know and love.

Additionally, local economies rely on the beautiful natural surroundings of the Alps, which attract skiers, riders and others from around the state and the country. Declining environments will impact on the numbers of visitors and hence local economies.

This short seminar will delve into the issue of fire, and how we need to respond to longer and more intense seasons in the Victorian mountains.

If you can’t attend the event, it will be livestreamed via the event facebook page.

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Here we go again: Cable car proposed for Mt Owen

In lutruwita/ Tasmania, there have been various proposals for cable cars up mountains. These include kunanyi/ Mt Wellington, above Hobart, Mt Roland in the north, and a proposed gondola to get tourists in to Dove Lake, below Cradle Mountain.

Now a new plan, put forward by a local businessman, is proposing a cable car up Mt Owen, a rugged mountain near Queenstown on the west coast.

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The Australian Alps Walking Track

There are many incredible long distance walking tracks crossing the mountains of the world. Some, like the Pacific Crest Trail or PCT, which goes from Mexico to the Canadian border, have a high profile and see thousands undertake (or at least start) the journey each year. After the Overland Track, our most famous long distance mountain walking track would be the Australian Alps Walking Track, or AAWT, which stands out because of the smaller numbers of people who undertake it, its relative remoteness, and the fact that long distances of poorly marked tracks can make for difficult route finding. There are not many towns along the way (only a couple of ski resorts) and food drops can be a lot of work to organise and very time consuming (in contrast, along the PCT people mail supplies to themselves in the towns the trail passes through).

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‘Feral horse removals in Kosciuszko must ramp-up significantly’

There has been a long struggle to get feral horse numbers managed properly across the mountains of south eastern Australia. The ACT, NSW and Victoria all manage the issue differently, but in NSW the need to manage numbers of feral animals has been caught up in a culture war narrative that has slowed and blocked meaningful action for many years.

The recent release of feral horse removal data for Kosciuszko National Park since February 2022 has highlighted the need to significantly increase removal efforts to protect one of Australia’s most important national parks.

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What should be in Mountain Journal magazine #3?

For the second year, Mountain Journal appeared as a magazine. This year, the print edition was produced as a collaboration with Mandy Lamont of Lamont magazine. It was distributed across resorts and valley towns during early winter.

The plan is to keep producing a printed annual edition, and I would really appreciate your feedback about this year’s edition and your thoughts on what should be in the 2023 edition.

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Mike Edmondson. Living the Dream.

If you follow social media related to backcountry skiing and riding in Australia, you are probably familiar with Mike Edmondson. His regular posts on touring in the Snowy Mountains are often beautiful and a nice reminder of what it looks like to be ‘Living the Dream’. Mike has a long connection to the mountains, a range of interests, and offers many services for people wanting to explore the Main Range.

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Alpine Odyssey – Toward the start line

Later this month, Huw Kingston will leave on his Alpine Odyssey, a winter crossing of the full length of the Australian Alps Walking Track. As he gets close to the start date, here is an update.

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Plans revealed for Falls Creek Lakeside Development project

The Falls Creek Alpine Resort Management Board (FCARMB) has released details about the proposed development of the Rocky Valley Lake foreshore. This focuses on the old Australian National Antarctic Research Expedition (ANARE) shed, which needs to be renovated to be usable.

The proposed developments are intended for year round use, meaning that the clearing of the Bogong High Plains road (which currently ends at the gate near Windy Corner) will be extended through to the Lakeside site. This will result in loss of crosscountry skier access, which FCARMB says will be ‘offset’ by an upgraded track to Nordic Bowl and beyond.

The new development will have a number of businesses, parking and public facilities and act as the staging point for winter backcountry touring on the east side of the High Plains.

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Climate change overwhelms the benefits of prescribed burning

We know that climate change is making our fire seasons longer and more intense. This brings up a range of problems and questions, including the need to increase ground and air capacity to fight fire, how we sustain volunteer and career firefighters through longer summers, how we grapple with the chance that we will get less support from overseas in coming years, and how we manage our landscapes and live in forested areas in a way that allows us to minimise the impacts of fire.

 

One of the tools we use to manage the intensity of fire is prescribed (or hazard or fuel reduction) burning. While Australia is a continent adapted to fire, there are ecological impacts, potentially both positive and negative, attached to fuel reduction operations.

 

New research says that the value of prescribed burning is declining as climate change drives more intense fire behaviour.

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Falls to Hotham Crossing: Visual Impact Assessment released

The Falls to Hotham Alpine Crossing is a popular 3 day walk across the Bogong High Plains. It has two designated campsites that you need to book. For many years the Victorian government has been pursuing the further development of the walk, with a diversion to Mt Feathertop. This would turn it into a five-day 57-kilometre walk. Many people have expressed concern that the proposal includes a commercial aspect, with four campsites with structures included as part of the plan, which would be run by a commercial operator. PV say that ‘walkers will still be able to camp in other locations along the track and complete the crossing for free if they don’t want to use the new overnight facilities’.

Community consultation was undertaken between 2016 and 2018 to create the Master Plan. Parks Victoria have just made two announcements about the project:

  • That K2LD Architects have been appointed to create designs for the project.
  • They have also released the Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment. PV say ‘This assessment is a detailed independent assessment of the visual impacts of the project on the landscape. In particular, it considers impacts of roofed accommodation’.

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The elders among the devastation

If you visit this website often you will be familiar with the depressing stories about the decline of the wonderful snow gum. Between dieback and more intense fire seasons, the iconic tree of the high country is in decline.

In recent decades, wildfire has been devastating huge areas of the Snow Gum forests, with significant fires in the Victorian High Country in 1998, 2002/3, 2006/7, 2013 and 2019/20. More than 90% of Snow Gum habitat has been burnt at least once in the last 20 years.

The species can survive fire. However, climate change driven fire seasons are leading to more frequent fire, which is causing more death of trees and changes to forest structure. In some instances, localised collapse of Snow Gum woodlands is now being observed. If you’re interested in the detail of this, check these articles.

But we still have a lot of amazing older and mixed age snow gum forests. And in the depressing reality of the 21st century, it’s good to celebrate and love the places that are still intact. Please share your favourite spots.

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The literature of the high country

Barry Lopez was a wonderful author who focused on exploring the relationship between human cultures and nature. He passed away in 2020. His famous work Arctic Dreams was the first of his books that I discovered, and I have enjoyed his essays for many years. I am currently working through Embrace Fearlessly the Burning World, which was published shortly after he died. It is a luminescent collection of essays and one really stood out for me: Out West. He embarks on a long road trip to try and connect with the western plains of the USA. As he leaves, he loads up the many books that reflect on, or are based in, the areas he would be visiting. There are many famous names and books on the list, from Wallace Stegner, Ansel Adams to Cormac McCartney. He reflects on how history is recorded, how land and place is captured in literature and art, and how our understanding of the past shifts according to the dominant narratives of our time.

That, of course, got me thinking about the books I would have with me as I started a long road trip of our mountains. This is the start of a fairly Victorian-centric list.

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