ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Viv Forbes has tertiary qualification in geology, chemistry, physics, maths, financial analysis, soil science and pasture management. He and his wife have had decades of experience in pasture and bushfire management in Queensland and Northern Territory.
SHE WRITES:
The destruction of Australia’s ancestral grasslands has received a massive boost in recent years by green extremists aiming to remove human activities from rural Australia by promoting more national parks, reservations, crown land, heritage areas, and “Wild Rivers.” Their bans on logging, hunting, grazing and regrowth clearing have turned many national parks into weed and pest havens.
Prevention of hazard reduction burning (the key tool used by generations of aborigines and early settlers to maintain Australia’s landscape) and the spread of carbon-credit forestry are accelerating the destruction of our prairie lands.
Once grasslands are invaded by woody scrubs, these quickly give protection to noxious weeds such as lantana, groundsel, prickly pear, and box-thorn, and vermin such as rabbits, foxes, wild dogs, cats, deer, and pigs.
Grasslands have another insidious green enemy — the spread of suffocating blankets of subsidized solar panels that steal the sunshine that all plants rely on.
The amazing grasses of the world and their edible seeds feed most of the animal kingdom, directly or indirectly. The deliberate sacrifice of grasslands to solar panels and woody weeds is another suicidal green policy.
Similar fire suppression of grasslands was a a major contributor to the Boulder wildfire a few weeks ago. Setting aside a large tract of cheatgrass upwind of the town that burned. Thanks greenies.