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Why Did Stopping Aboriginal Burning Change the Landscape? - The Colonial Misreading of the Australian Landscape | Sleepy Facts About History · Sleepy Facts About History

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Welcome to Sleepy Facts About History. When the
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early 19th century explorer Thomas Mitchell rode
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through eastern Australia, he described open
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grassy woodlands that looked to his eye like
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an English park. He assumed he was passing through
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untouched wilderness, but the landscapes European
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colonists admired were not wild or accidental.
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They were the result of millennia of deliberate,
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knowledgeable burning by Aboriginal Australians.
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This episode examines the practice of cultural
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burning, explaining how hundreds of distinct
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nations use carefully timed, low -intensity fires
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to manage plants, control animal populations,
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and maintain travel routes across the continent.
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The disruption of this management system began
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almost immediately with colonization. Through
1:01
displacement, introduced disease, and the explicit
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criminalization of Aboriginal fire practices,
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the continuous care of the country was interrupted.
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Colonists feared any fire, and recategorized
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the traditional fire stick as a tool of arson.
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Without regular, small -scale burning, vegetation
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thickened, fuel accumulated, and the landscape
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transformed into the highly flammable environment
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that contributes to the catastrophic bushfires
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of the modern era, I kept returning to one central
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question while working on this episode. How do
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we see the land around us, and what histories
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are hidden by assuming a landscape is simply
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natural? The realization that what Europeans
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called wilderness was actually attended managed
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ecosystem challenges. Not just our ecological
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assumptions, but our historical and moral understanding
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of the past. Exploring this subject reveals how
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the interruption of traditional knowledge has
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lasting, visible consequences, and why modern
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collaborations with Aboriginal ranger groups
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are now looking to these ancient practices for
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answers. Thomas Mitchell rode through country
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that looked, to him, like an English park. It
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seemed open, gracious and ready for settlement.
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What he could not see was that he was passing
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through a landscape shaped by millennia of deliberate,
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knowledgeable burning, and the interruption of
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that care was already beginning to change the
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very ground beneath his horse's hooves. In the
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early 19th century, the explorer and surveyor
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Thomas Mitchell led expeditions through the interior
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of what is now eastern Australia. He kept careful
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notes. He described open woodlands with grassy
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understories, clear enough to ride through without
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difficulty. The country looked, to his eye, like
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an English park. It seemed tidy, spacious, and
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deliberate. He assumed this was simply what Australian
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nature looks like when left alone. Other colonists
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agreed. Painters depicted the same landscapes.
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They showed scattered trees, bright grass, and
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abundant game. The assumption was stable and
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largely unquestioned. Australia was wilderness,
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and wilderness meant absence of human shaping.
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But there is another possibility, and it changes
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how we understand almost everything that follows.
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The landscapes Mitchell saw were not untouched.
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They were tended. Across the continent, Aboriginal
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people had been burning country for tens of thousands
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of years. This burning was not random, and it
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was not destructive. It was precise and purposeful.
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The open woodlands, the grassy clearings, and
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the very visibility that made European travel
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and settlement possible were, in many places,
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the product of fire applied by people who knew
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exactly what they were doing. When those people
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were removed, and when their burning was banned,
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the country changed. The ecological systems communists
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believed they had merely occupied were already,
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invisibly, beginning to transform. This is not
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a story of primitive people accidentally shaping
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their environment. It is not a story of universal
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Aboriginal practice applied identically across
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a continent. It is the story of hundreds of nations,
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each with distinct languages, territories and
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seasonal knowledge systems, using fire deliberately
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and variably to manage plants, animals, travel
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routes, hunting and risk. And it is the story
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of what happened when that knowledge was suppressed.
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It is the story of what happened when the custodians
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were displaced and when the fire they carried
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was criminalized. To understand this, we need
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to begin with what Aboriginal burning actually
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was and what it was not. Fire is natural to Australia.
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Lightning has ignited bushfires for millions
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of years, long before humans arrived. Many Australian
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plants are adapted to fire. Some need it to germinate.
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Others reshoot quickly from root stock. Still
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others depend on smoke cues to release seed.
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The continent's ecology and fire are inseparable.
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But Aboriginal burning was not the same as lightning
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fire. It was cultural burning. It was deliberate,
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knowledgeable, small -scale and carefully timed.
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The practices varied enormously. In the tropical
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savannas of Arnhem Land, people burned during
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the early dry season, when humidity was still
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relatively high and fires would creep slowly.
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This cleared grass and created mosaics of burned
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and unburned patches. In the arid interior, spinifex
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country, burning was more episodic. It was tied
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to rainfall patterns and the movement of people
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across vast distances. In southeastern Australia's
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grassy woodlands, fires were lit to maintain
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open understories. They encouraged green pick
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that attracted kangaroos and emus. They also
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cleared around camping areas. In Tasmania's bottom
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grass plains, fire kept the plains open and prevented
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rainforest invasion. Along the coast, Heathlands
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were burned to promote fruit plants and ease
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travel. What governed these practices was detailed
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seasonal knowledge, encoded in local calendars,
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stories, and continuous observation. People knew
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when particular plants flowered. They knew when
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certain insects appeared. They knew when winds
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shifted and when humidity dropped. They knew
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which country had been burned recently and which
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had not. They understood how fire behaved on
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different slopes, in different soils, and with
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different wind directions. This was not written
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down in manuals. It was held in memory, transmitted
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through generations, tested and adjusted through
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experience. The result was what ecologists now
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call mosaic burning. This was a patchwork of
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recently burned and older vegetation across the
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landscape. Recently burned patches offered fresh
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green growth that attracted grazing animals.
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Older patches provided shelter and food for other
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species. The mosaic created edges, variety and
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movement. It also created natural fire. A fire
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in one patch would reach the edge of a recently
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burned area and die out, lacking fuel. The landscape
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was not uniform. It was varied, dynamic. and
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in many ways, resilient. This was the country
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that Europeans encountered. But they did not
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see the management. They saw the outcome, and
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they misread it. The colonial misreading had
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several sources. One was simply ignorance. Europeans
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had no framework for understanding deliberate
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landscape burning by people they categorized
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as primitive hunters. Another source was timing.
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By the time many colonists arrived in particular
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areas, Aboriginal populations had already been
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reduced by introduced disease. Smallpox, influenza
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and measles had spread ahead of settlement. Others
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had been displaced by earlier frontier violence.
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The custodians were gone or diminished, and their
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burning had already begun to lapse. What colonists
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saw was sometimes a landscape in transition.
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not the tended country of earlier decades. Yet
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they interpreted it as original, natural, and
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stable. There was also an aesthetic and ideological
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dimension. The park -like landscapes appealed
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to European agricultural sensibilities. They
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looked like improved land, ready for sheep and
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cattle. Describing them as natural wilderness
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served colonial purposes. If the land was untouched,
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it was available for improvement. for settlement,
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and for conversion to European use. Aboriginal
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presence was simultaneously invisible and inconvenient.
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It was invisible because the management was subtle
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and continuous rather than monumental. It was
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inconvenient because recognizing it would complicate
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claims of terra nullius, empty land. So the baseline
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was established. Australian nature in the European
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imagination. was a wilderness that happened to
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be conveniently open and grassy. The fact that
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it was already managed was systematically overlooked.
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The term we now use for this management, fire
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stick farming, entered scholarly discourse in
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1969 when the archaeologist Rhys Jones published
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an article with that title. Jones argued that
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Aboriginal burning was not incidental but systematic.
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He described it as a form of land management
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comparable in its effects to agriculture. The
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term has been enormously influential. It has
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also been criticized. It is an analytical label,
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not an indigenous self -description. Some aboriginal
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scholars and knowledge holders find it misleading.
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It implies a parallel to European farming that
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may not capture indigenous conceptual categories.
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Country. in many aboriginal understandings is
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not a resource to be farmed it is a living relational
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entity encompassing people ancestors plants animals
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and ongoing responsibility the term fire stick
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farming can obscure this nevertheless jones's
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core insight is reshaped understanding aboriginal
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fire was not random it was skilled purposeful
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and ecologically consequential the question became
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not whether aboriginal burning shaped australian
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landscapes but how much in what ways and with
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what variation to answer this we need to look
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more closely at what burning actually accomplished
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at the most basic level fire cleared accumulated
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fuel this included dry grass leaf litter and
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fallen branches Without regular burning, this
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material builds up. When it eventually ignites
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by lightning, accident or arson, the fire burns
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hotter, faster and more destructively. Aboriginal
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burning, by contrast, was typically low intensity.
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A person walking with a smouldering fire stick,
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often just a piece of bark or wood kept light,
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would light small patches of grass as they moved.
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The fire would creep. not race. It would clear
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the ground without crowning into tree canopies.
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The smell would be of smoke and warmed earth,
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not of catastrophic combustion. This fuel management
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was not abstract or precautionary in the modern
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sense. It was embedded in immediate purposes.
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Burning encouraged particular plants, including
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yams, tubers, grass seeds, and fruits. It improved
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visibility for hunting. It cleared travel routes.
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It signaled presence and ownership. It managed
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the distribution and abundance of animals. Kangaroos
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and wallabies were attracted to fresh green growth
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in burned patches. This made them more predictable
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and accessible. Emus moved differently through
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burned and unburned country. Reptiles became
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visible or vulnerable in particular conditions.
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The cumulative effect was landscape scale. Over
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generations repeated burning at particular seasons
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and intensities shaped vegetation composition.
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Fire -tolerant species were favored. Fire -sensitive
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species were restricted to refuges. Grasslands
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were maintained against shrub invasion. Open
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woodlands were kept open. The boundaries between
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vegetation types were stabilized or shifted.
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This was not total manufacture. Climate, soil,
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topography, and natural fire all remained influential.
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But Aboriginal burning was a significant co -shaper.
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It was a continuous selective pressure applied
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with knowledge and intention. The evidence for
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this comes from multiple sources. Colonial journals
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and paintings provide snapshots, though these
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snapshots require critical reading. Ecological
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studies compare landscapes with and without ongoing
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Aboriginal burning. They also track vegetation
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change through repeat photography. In some places,
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photographs from the early 20th century show
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open woodlands that are now dense with saplings
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and shrubs. Pollen records and charcoal deposits
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in lake sediments reveal long -term fire histories.
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Interpreting these requires care. Charcoal can
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indicate either frequent low -intensity fires
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or occasional catastrophic ones. Archaeological
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sites show the distribution of food, plants and
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animals over time. This suggests how burning
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shaped resource availability. And in parts of
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Northern Australia, where Aboriginal custodianship
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and burning have continued more strongly, the
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practices themselves can be observed and documented.
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Consider one concrete example from the repeat
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photography studies. A photograph taken in southeastern
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Australia around 1900 shows a grassy woodland.
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It shows scattered eucalypts with broad, spreading
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canopies. The ground between them is open and
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grassy. Visibility extends tens of meters. The
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same site photographed today shows a transformed
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scene. The scattered trees remain. But they are
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now crowded by dense saplings and shrubs that
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have grown up in the understory. The open ground
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is gone. The visibility that once extended across
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the landscape is now blocked by woody regrowth.
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The change is not dramatic in the sense of a
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single event. It is gradual and cumulative. It
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is the result of decades without burning. But
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the two images side by side make the transformation
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visible. What was once open, grazed, maintained
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country has become thicker, more continuous,
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and more flammable. What emerges is a picture
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of sophisticated, place -specific knowledge systems
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applied continuously over millennia. They were
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not universal, and they were not uniform. But
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they were widespread and consequential. Then
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colonization intervened, and the burning stopped.
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The mechanisms of disruption were multiple and
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mutually reinforcing. Direct violence and displacement
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removed people from their country. Introduced
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diseases, smallpox especially, but also influenza,
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measles and tuberculosis devastated Aboriginal
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populations. This sometimes happened ahead of
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European settlement itself. It left landscapes
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already depastoralized before colonists arrived
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to describe them. Pastoral occupation brought
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sheep and cattle that changed vegetation through
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grazing and trampling. They compacted soils,
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spread weeds and altered fire behaviour. Fixed
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settlements, fences and property boundaries fragmented
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country and restricted movement. And legal regimes
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explicitly criminalised Aboriginal burning. Picture
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what this meant for the landscape itself, where
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a mosaic of burned... and unburned patches had
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once created variety and movement, the pattern
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began to blur. The edges disappeared. Grass grew
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long and continuous where it had been patchy.
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The careful maintenance of boundaries between
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vegetation types lapsed. It was, in a sense,
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like an abandoned field. It was not ruined and
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it was not destroyed, but it was untended. Each
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grew according to its own accumulated momentum
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rather than according to human intention. The
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fuel accumulated quietly, year by year, in places
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where it would once have been cleared. Settlers
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feared fire. Their fears were not irrational.
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Fire threatened fences, stock, crops, buildings
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and lives. In a landscape converted to European
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property relations, Any fire was potentially
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catastrophic. A single escaped burn could destroy
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a season's worth of pasture, or a wool shed,
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or a fence line that took weeks to build. The
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introduced grasses that settlers planted their
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livestock often burnt more readily than native
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vegetation. This made the danger more acute.
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Aboriginal burning, which had been continuous
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and controlled, was recategorized as arson, as
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vandalism. and as primitive irresponsibility.
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The fire stick itself, once a tool of management,
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became in settler eyes evidence of wrongdoing.
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People who continued to burn faced prosecution,
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imprisonment, or removal to missions and reserves.
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In some cases, burning was tolerated or even
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requested by settlers who recognized its benefits
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for pasture. But the general trend was suppression.
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It was systematic, legal, and enforced. The consequences
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unfolded over decades and centuries, and they
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were not what carnists expected. Without frequent
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low -intensity burning, vegetation thickened.
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Grasslands were invaded by shrubs and saplings.
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Open woodlands became dense. Fuel accumulated.
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This included dry grass, leaf litter, fallen
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branches and dead undergrowth. The mosaic of
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burned and unburned patches disappeared. The
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landscape became more uniform, more continuous
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and more flammable. When fires did occur, and
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they did from lightning, accident, arson or escaped
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pastoral burns, they behaved differently. They
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were larger, hotter and more destructive. They
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crowned into tree canopies, kinning mature trees
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that would have survived low -intensity ground
20:59
fires. They burn through areas that would previously
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have been firebreaks. The ecological systems
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colonists believed they had merely occupied were
21:09
transforming around them. But the transformation
21:12
was invisible against the false baseline of natural
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wilderness. This is not to say that all modern
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bushfires are caused solely by the cessation
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of Aboriginal burning. Climate change with hotter,
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drier conditions and more extreme fire weather
21:29
is a major factor. Invasive species, including
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grasses that burn more readily than native vegetation,
21:37
have altered fire behaviour in many areas. Land
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use change, including urban expansion, forestry
21:44
and agriculture, has fragmented and modified
21:46
landscapes. The story is not monocausal, but
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the removal of Aboriginal burning is a significant,
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and long overlooked, part of it. The recognition
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of this has been gradual and contested. For much
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of the 20th century, Australian conservation
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and fire management operated within the wilderness
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framework. This was the assumption that the best
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state for natural areas was absence of human
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influence. Fire was seen as primarily destructive
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to be suppressed where possible. This was the
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era of total fire suppression in many parts of
22:25
Australia. It was modeled partly on North American
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practice. It had similar unintended consequences.
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Fuel built up and eventually fires became more
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severe. The re -evaluation began in the latter
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20th century. It came partly through ecological
22:44
research. It came partly through the persistence
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of Aboriginal knowledge in Northern Australia,
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where colonial disruption was somewhat less complete
22:54
and where traditional burning continued more
22:57
strongly. In Arnhem land and other parts of northern
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Australia's tropical savannas, Aboriginal burning
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had never fully ceased. The practices were adapted,
23:08
sometimes restricted to particular areas or seasons,
23:11
but the knowledge remained. You can still see
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it in the early dry season. A person walks through
23:18
tall grass with a fire. The small flames creep
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rather than race. The smoke hangs low in the
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humid air. The blackened patches appear against
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the unburned green. The same principle that shaped
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the open woodlands Mitchell rode through, small,
23:37
controlled, timely burns creating a mosaic, continued
23:41
here. It continued on a changed landscape and
23:45
under new constraints. Beginning in the late
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20th century, researchers and land managers began
23:52
to document these practices more systematically.
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They found that early dry season burning, as
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practiced by aboriginal custodians created the
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characteristic mosaics that reduced the extent
24:05
and intensity of late tri -season fires late
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season fires when they occurred in unburned areas
24:12
were hotter and more destructive they released
24:16
more carbon damaged more habitat and threatened
24:19
rock art and other cultural sites this recognition
24:24
led to collaborations The West Arnhem Land Fire
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Abatement Project, established in the early 21st
24:31
century, brought together Aboriginal ranger groups,
24:34
scientists, and carbon market mechanisms. Traditional
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burning was conducted from the ground and from
24:41
helicopters. Picture a helicopter moving low
24:45
over the savannah. A range of drops incendiaries
24:49
or lights from the air. The small fires creep
24:53
through the grass below. From above, The mosaic
24:57
pattern is visible. Patches of blackened ground
25:00
stand against unburned green. It is the same
25:04
patchwork that was once created by a person walking
25:07
with a smoldering stick. The reduced extent of
25:11
late -season wildfires generated carbon credits.
25:14
This provided economic return that supported
25:17
continued custodianship. Biodiversity monitoring
25:21
showed benefits for particular species. The project
25:25
demonstrated that Aboriginal fire knowledge could
25:28
address contemporary problems. It was not romantic
25:31
tradition. It was practical, tested, applicable
25:35
management. Similar collaborations have developed
25:40
elsewhere, though unevenly. In southeastern Australia,
25:44
where Aboriginal displacement was more complete
25:46
and traditional knowledge more fragmented, reintegration
25:50
has been harder. Some programs involve Aboriginal
25:54
communities in prescribed burning, but the knowledge
25:58
base is patchier, and the ecological and social
26:01
contexts are different. The grassy woodlands
26:05
that Mitchell rode through have been transformed
26:08
by nearly two centuries of grazing, clearing,
26:11
weed invasion, and changed fire regimes. Simply
26:17
reintroducing burning is not straightforward.
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The burning that would be appropriate now must
26:22
be worked out through careful experimentation,
26:25
observation and partnership. The broader significance
26:29
of this history extends beyond fire management
26:32
itself. It concerns how we understand Australian
26:36
landscapes and their histories. The wilderness
26:39
idea, the notion that Australia was a continent
26:42
of untouched nature, has deep roots in European
26:46
thought, and it has been remarkably persistent.
26:50
It underpinned conservation frameworks that sought
26:53
to remove human influence. It shaped how Australians
26:57
experienced their own country. They saw it as
27:00
a place of natural beauty and danger, sublime
27:03
and indifferent, rather than as a place of continuous
27:06
human relationship and responsibility. The revelation
27:10
that this wilderness was, in many places, tended
27:13
country challenges not just ecological assumptions,
27:16
but historical and moral ones. It raises questions
27:20
about what was lost, what was overlooked, and
27:24
what might be recovered. But we need to be careful
27:28
here. The correction of one misconception should
27:31
not produce another. Aboriginal burning was not
27:35
universal, uniform or total in its effects. Not
27:39
every Australian landscape was shaped by it.
27:42
Some areas, particularly rainforests and wetter
27:45
forests, were naturally fire -resistant. and
27:48
may have been little affected. The arid interior's
27:52
fire regimes were always more episodic and climate
27:55
-driven. Even where burning was practiced, its
27:58
effects varied with intensity, frequency, season,
28:01
and local conditions. And Aboriginal societies
28:05
themselves were diverse. They included hundreds
28:09
of nations with different relationships to country,
28:12
different knowledge systems, and different histories
28:15
of colonization and survival. Nor should we assume
28:19
that pre -colonial landscapes were static or
28:22
optimal. Aboriginal burning was continuous management,
28:26
not preservation of a fixed state. Landscapes
28:30
changed, adapted, and responded. Some species
28:33
benefited. Others were restricted. The management
28:38
was purposeful, but purposes varied and shifted.
28:42
There is no single Aboriginal fire calendar that
28:45
can be recovered and applied. What exists? Where
28:49
it exists is specific knowledge tied to specific
28:52
country, held by specific custodians. The term
28:57
firestick farming remains useful as an analytical
29:00
shorthand, but it should be used with its limitations
29:03
visible. It is not an indigenous term. It implies
29:08
an agricultural analogy that may not fit. It
29:12
can suggest a level of control and uniformity
29:15
that was not present. What Aboriginal burning
29:18
actually involved was more like continuous, knowledgeable
29:21
conversation with country. It involved observing,
29:25
responding, adjusting, and maintaining relationships
29:29
over time. What colonists did in suppressing
29:34
this burning was not preserve nature, but interrupt
29:37
a long -running management system. The consequences?
29:41
Thicker vegetation, accumulated fuel. Changed
29:45
fire regimes and more severe fires were ecological,
29:49
but they were also historical. They resulted
29:53
from specific decisions, specific fears, specific
29:57
legal frameworks, and specific displacements.
30:00
The landscape that Europeans thought was natural
30:04
was, in many places, already the product of human
30:08
action. The landscape they created through suppression
30:11
was. equally a product of human action the one
30:16
they did not intend or understand this is the
30:20
central insight the wilderness was not wild removing
30:25
its custodians did not return it to nature it
30:30
changed it the ecological systems colonists believe
30:34
they had merely occupied were in fact systems
30:37
they were already unwittingly altering the modern
30:42
re -engagement with Aboriginal fire knowledge
30:44
is partial, contested and geographically uneven.
30:49
In Northern Australia, where traditional burning
30:52
has remained stronger, collaborations between
30:55
Aboriginal rangers and scientists have produced
30:58
documented benefits for carbon reduction, biodiversity
31:01
and cultural maintenance. In Southern Australia,
31:06
the challenges are greater. There is more fragmented
31:09
knowledge. More transformed landscapes, more
31:13
complex property and governance arrangements,
31:15
and more extreme fire weather under climate change.
31:19
The solutions, if they come, will require sustained
31:22
partnership, humility and patience. What we can
31:26
say with confidence is this. Aboriginal people
31:30
used fire deliberately and knowledgeably across
31:33
much of Australia for millennia. Their practices
31:38
varied by region, season and purpose. governed
31:41
by detailed local knowledge the landscapes europeans
31:46
encountered and described as natural wilderness
31:48
were in many places shaped by this burning colonization
31:53
disrupted the burning through violence disease
31:56
displacement and legal prohibition the interruption
32:00
changed ecological systems contributing to few
32:04
accumulation and more severe fires in many areas
32:08
Modern research and some land management practice
32:11
have begun to recognise and reintegrate this
32:14
knowledge, though the work is incomplete and
32:17
the challenges are significant. What remains
32:20
uncertain is also important. The precise pre
32:24
-colonial fire regimes of many regions cannot
32:27
be reconstructed with certainty. The relative
32:30
contributions of Aboriginal burning, climate
32:33
and natural fire to particular vegetation patterns
32:36
remain debated. The full extent of Aboriginal
32:39
fire knowledge that has been lost is unknown.
32:42
The interaction between traditional burning and
32:45
contemporary climate change is still being worked
32:47
out. These uncertainties should not paralyse
32:51
action, but they should inform it. The story
32:55
of Aboriginal fire and its suppression is, ultimately,
32:58
a story about how we see landscapes and what
33:02
we fail to see in them. The park -like woodlands
33:06
that Thomas Mitchell rode through were not simply
33:08
Australian nature. They were country. They were
33:12
tended, known, and maintained through generations
33:15
of careful burning. The colonists who saw wilderness
33:20
were looking at a management system they did
33:22
not recognize, maintained by people they did
33:25
not understand. When that system was interrupted,
33:28
the country changed. The fires that followed,
33:32
larger, hotter, and more destructive, were not
33:35
a return to natural state but the consequence
33:38
of a specific historical rupture understanding
33:42
this does not solve the challenges of contemporary
33:45
fire management but it changes the questions
33:49
we ask it asks us to recognize that many australian
33:53
landscapes carry long histories of human relationship
33:56
it asks us to recognize that these relationships
33:59
were knowledgeable and purposeful it asks us
34:03
to recognize that their interruption had real
34:06
lasting visible consequences the wilderness europeans
34:10
thought they found was in many places actively
34:14
tended country removing its custodians did not
34:18
preserve nature it altered the ecological systems
34:21
carnists believed they had merely occupied and
34:25
we are still living with that alteration today