576 journal of forestry 



"Light Burning," as Viewed by Australian Foresters 



In the December, 1920, number of the Australian Forestry Journal 

 there appears an article on page 3T3, entitled "Fires in Eucalypt 

 Forests." Some of the material in this article has a very familiar 

 sound. It states, for instance : 



"There is, however, a specious contention which has become fairly 

 universal in Australia and has even found official recognition. It is 

 said that the only way to control the bush fire is to run a creeping 

 ground fire through the eucalypt forest as frequently as possible, and 

 thus prevent the possibility of a big blaze damaging the forest. This 

 end may be obtained, but at what cost ? Have we any reason for sup- 

 posing that the food material of trees in Australia diiTers radically 

 from the food material of trees on the continent of Europe? European 

 experience has proved conclusively that leaf mould and litter on the 

 floor of the forest is indispensable to the successful growth of a 

 forest, yet it is common practice to despise it utterly in Australia, and 

 rule it out as of no account. To take a single instance : In the South 

 of France Pinus pinaster was found to grow successfully on bare white 

 sand which had been temporarily fixed by scattering brushwood and 

 weighting it with spadefuls of sand. The cluster pine grew and de- 

 veloped into satisfactory trees yielding a valuable return of turpentine 

 and timber. Happily, the trees were too inflammable and the French 

 forester was too well trained to eliminate fire risks by burning up the 

 needles and branchwood as they fell. Instead, they established fire- 

 breaks and built watch towers so that serious fires are practically un- 

 known. The beneficial result is now being felt, for the second crop 

 of pines is growing more rapidly and developing into a better class of 

 tree than the first. This is solely the result of fire protection and 

 preservation of leaf and branch litter cast by the trees." 



In speaking of timber in the Jarrah belt of western Australia the 

 article goes on to say : 



"Recent measurements show that these are developing at a very 

 much slower rate than has been believed in the past, and it can be quite 

 logically postulated that repeated firing of the jarrah bush, whereby 

 the top soil is baked hard and every vestige of humus destroyed, is 

 slowing up the rate of growth of the jarrah. The cry that it is im- 

 possible to prevent and control fires in a eucalypt forest, whether it be 

 stringy-bark, ironbark or jarrah, is tlie cry of a small man faced zcith 

 a big problem." 



Is it out of place to ask here whether foresters in the United States 

 who are faced with the same problem of fire control in the southern 

 United States are going to plead guilty to the indictment in the last 

 sentence of this quoted article? 



