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People and Parks: bearing the brunt of climate inaction

Mountain Journal has run hundreds of articles on the impacts of climate change on wild places in the mountains of south eastern Australia and lutruwita/ Tasmania. Sadly, these impacts are being felt in parks around the continent.

This piece from Madoc Sheehan (originally published here) looks at the environmental and economic impacts of high intensity rainfall events in Paluma Range national park over January/February 2025 and similar climate impacts in the Blue Mountains and Boodjamulla national parks.

Continue reading “People and Parks: bearing the brunt of climate inaction” →

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VIC government must increase efforts to sustain Ash forests

Ash forests – forest comprised of Mountain Ash, Alpine Ash, or sometimes both – are some of the most iconic forest types in Victoria, or even the world. Covering around 500,000 ha of Victoria and stretching from the Otways to the north-eastern boundary with NSW, their stronghold is in the Central Highlands to the east of Melbourne and through the higher ranges of Gippsland and the north east of the state.

These forests have a complex relationship with fire: these forests can live with some fire – but not too much. Scientifically known as ‘obligate seeders’, after severe bushfire, ash forests are killed, but prolifically regenerates from canopy stored seed. The important point here is that these slowly regenerating forests cannot produce seed for 20 years after they regenerate from fire. This means they are highly vulnerable to shortened fire intervals – the exact challenge that land managers in Victoria are facing with climate change.

Once a mountain ash or alpine ash forest has burnt numerous times, it may eventually fail to regenerate, which can lead to population collapse and a change of ecosystem type. This sounds simple, but ecologically, this is dramatic. A tall forest – high in carbon stocks and habitat – changes rapidly to a short shrubland or grassland.

This not theory. This situation already exists among alpine ash forests. The massive bushfires in 1998, 2003, 2006, 2009, 2013, 2014 and 2019/20 and meant that over 97% of Alpine Ash distribution burnt. These fires overlapped and some areas burnt two to three times across two decades (Fagg et al. 2013; Bassett et al. 2021), leaving 43,000 ha of Alpine Ash forest at risk of collapse (Fairman, 2023).

Mountain Journal has long reported about threats to Ash forests and the need for greater government intervention (check here for some of the articles).

Now people involved in the recovery of Ash forests have recently spoken out about the threats posed to these forests.

Continue reading “VIC government must increase efforts to sustain Ash forests” →

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Heading off ecological collapse in the mountains

Snow Gums are the classic alpine tree of the Australian High Country. And they’re now at risk.
Snow gums 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. Dieback, which is caused by a native beetle, but becoming more damaging due to the effects of climate change, is devastating large sections of the high country. In many places, localised ecological collapse is now occurring.

Continue reading “Heading off ecological collapse in the mountains” →

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Dark Days while we wait for the White

I love my backcountry trips and my traditions of getting into the Big Wild. The annual multi day walk in lutruwita/ Tasmania with some mates, the new years eve wander and camp out on Mt Stirling, the road trip to the Snowy Mountains in May. I notice sometimes that half the enjoyment comes from planning and then reflecting on the trip (especially when the actual trip ends up being Type 2 fun).

But this year has been different. After two grim winters, I’ve been obsessing over the forecasts for this season. And as we know they aren’t great. I know that we will get a break at some point, that we will continue to get good and bad winters. But as we pass through another warm autumn, it really does feel like we have crossed some invisible tipping point. As happened with bushfires in the mountains, which suddenly did a ‘step change’ in intensity in the early 2000s, you have to wonder if we have stepped over into a new world where, in Australia at least, our snow pack resembles the boom and bust cycles that have long dominated mountain snow in Tasmania, and less like the consistent snow pack we have generally relied on here on the mainland.

Continue reading “Dark Days while we wait for the White” →

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The snow gums of Baw Baw

From Matt Tomkins.

This photo essay was originally published in the Mountain Journal magazine, 2025 edition, available here.

The last few winters I’ve become a bit obsessed with making trips to see the snow gums in  Baw Baw National Park.

Snow gums are beautiful trees. To see them at their best, you really need to be up there in winter. Streaked with incredibly vibrant reds, bronzes, oranges, and yellows and covered \with ice, their vivid colours and twisted forms stand out like flames against a snowy backdrop. It’s one of the most magical things about winter in the Australian Alps, and it’s a sight that can’t be seen anywhere else in the world.

I feel an increasing sense of urgency about making these trips.

Continue reading “The snow gums of Baw Baw” →

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Mountain Journal magazine #5 now available

The Mountain Journal magazine is now in its 5th year of production. We print 1,000 copies and distribute it for free through mountain and valley towns between Melbourne and Canberra during autumn each year. This year we had a guest editor – Anna Langford, who has produced an absolutely gorgeous magazine with the assistance of designer Tess Sellar and beautiful images from a range of people including Matt Tomkins.

The theme delves into what is happening to Winter. As Anna says in her introduction: “Long, deep winters are fast becoming folk tales of the past. But there is still so much to love, and so much we can do to act. To talk about our alpine winters is to lament what we’ve lost, celebrate
what we still have, record it for collective memory, and impel each other to step up and take action“.

Continue reading “Mountain Journal magazine #5 now available” →

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Alpine Odyssey Aotearoa to cross NZ from north to south

Many backcountry enthusiasts will be familiar with Huw Kingston. Most recently he has released and toured the film Alpine Odyssey, which covers his winter crossing of the Australian Alps during 2022, which was unusual because he visited all of the ski resorts along the way.

Now he is planning a winter crossing of Aotearoa New Zealand. Traveling from the tip of the North Island to the bottom of the South, he and his friend Laurence Mote plan to ski, cycle, walk and sail the full length of both islands. They also intend to ski at all 24 ski fields in the country. They start their journey on 25 June.

You can read more below.

Continue reading “Alpine Odyssey Aotearoa to cross NZ from north to south” →

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We know how this story goes. But we could decide to change the ending.

We know that climate change is reducing the overall amount of snow we receive in Australia. The snow pack has been in decline since at least 1957. We also know that the loss of snow is being felt especially at lower elevations.

We also know that as snow pack dwindles and the snow line climbs up the mountains that we have already lost a number of previous centres of snow culture – like at Mt Buffalo where there used to be a small resort with ski runs, and people would ice skate on Lake Catani, while the famous Buffalo chalet provided great holidays in the snow in a beautiful setting. The old ski lifts at Buffalo have now been dismantled.

In the 1920s and 1930s people could ice skate on the lakes in Mt Field national park in lutruwita/ Tasmania, including at the famous Twilight Tarn and there was even a small outdoors ice rink on the summit of kunanyi/ Mt Wellington, above Hobart.

In the early 1900s, a popular ice-skating venue at the time, Pine Lake on the Central Plateau in Tasmania was chosen for the intention of establishing Tasmania as “the Switzerland of Australia” by establishing a “Ice yachting” venue (where specially built yachts could skim across the top of the frozen lake). Source.

The small resorts at Mt Mawson (Mt Field national park) and at Ben Lomond in the north east of the state really struggle to get enough snow cover to justify opening the ski tows.

Spring skiing in the mountains of lutruwita/ Tasmania was a thing up until the 1990s. Now good snow pack in the spring months is a rarity that must be grabbed if you have the chance.

Kiandra in the Snowy Mountains was the birthplace of skiing in Australia (as pointed out in this recent podcast from Protect Our Winters). Australia’s first T-bar lift had been installed on Township Hill near Kiandra in 1957. Now the valleys and hills around the old settlement rarely hold skiable snow for long.

Continue reading “We know how this story goes. But we could decide to change the ending.” →

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What does the ‘State of the Climate’ report mean for mountain environments?

The biennial State of the Climate Report, which is produced by the CSIRO and BOM has now been released. The report draws on the latest national and international climate research, monitoring, science and projection information to describe changes and long-term trends in Australia’s climate.

Among a vast amount of information, there are some clear details relevant to mountain environments.

Continue reading “What does the ‘State of the Climate’ report mean for mountain environments?” →

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Managing the grief

For the last few years, Friends of the Earth has been hosting guided walks in the high country to show people areas at risk from logging. These have included Mt Stirling, the upper Little Dargo River, and the stronghold of older snow gums that exists at Mt Wills and which would have been put at risk by logging that had been planned for Alpine Ash forests on the mountain.

With the government announcing an end to logging on public lands in the east of the state in early 2024, we shifted the focus of our walks onto snow gum woodlands, which are increasingly being impacted by climate change driven fire regimes and dieback caused by a native beetle.

In early 2024 we led a walk to visit what we called the ‘ghost forests’ of the high ridge between the Tawonga huts and Mt Fainter on the north western edge of the Bogong High Plains.

Continue reading “Managing the grief” →

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Letter home from the Arctic: when will we miss winter?

A reflection from Anna Langford, currently in the Arctic Circle region of Norway.

 

People keep asking me why I have come to spend three months in the Arctic Circle. They need a beat of stunned silence to comprehend my answer, ‘to be cold’.

I’m well-practiced at riding out the response – the loss of words, usually followed by a guffaw of laughter and a light-hearted insult. And sometimes a nervous flicker in the eyes, as though I’ve just given myself away as a ghoulish creature who flinches at the touch of sunlight.

I have been travelling since January, when I chose to bail on an Australian summer in favour of an English winter. ‘What are you doing here?!’ people would splutter, upon finding out where I had come from. Had I accidentally stumbled into Melbourne airport and onto a flight to London while on my way to the beach?

Continue reading “Letter home from the Arctic: when will we miss winter?” →

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Winter 2024 – the washup

If you were in the Victorian mountains during that amazing storm that passed through in the third week of July, you will have experienced winter at its best. In the Victorian backcountry we had already lost much of the base and the fresh snow was unconsolidated, but it didn’t really matter because there was so much of it. That wonderful and particular sound of fresh dry powder creaking underfoot as you weave through the trees on the uphill and that weightlessness as you head back down truly is magic (it always reminds me of that opening scene in the Valhalla film from Sweetgrass – When you’ve seen the season’s first great snow through the eyes of a child—you’ve known true happiness).

Then the blow drier was turned on, and we all know what happened next. Despite the amazing efforts of the resort groomers, the resorts started to close – the lower elevation ones like Mt Selwyn went first (consistent with what we expect from climate change). As of September 8 there is still cover in the Main Range and a few lifts are still going in places like Falls Creek. But basically the season is done – a whole month early.

This is obviously a huge blow for the businesses who are on their second short winter and everyone who was reliant on a full winter working in a resort or valley town. And, of course, it’s a drag for everyone who just wants to go skiing or riding.

Continue reading “Winter 2024 – the washup” →

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