21 December

Thinking through the bushfires. Several historians have showed that what we now see as the 'bush' - mostly trees - used to be a mosaic of open and closed spaces. Compare this early Australian painting with the same spot in a photo, and you can see it. In fact all over the world thinking on landscape is showing the same thing; so often it's a mosaic driven by big herbivores, that since human intervention has become either desert (the bits we 'farm') or endless trees ('national parks'). These fires show I think that we need to fundamentally change how we THINK about landscape. We may need to clear a lot of trees in national parks to create these mosaics again, for example, to let our roos manage the grasslands again (why they end up on our front lawns, the trees have been allowed to take over far too much space). Unthinking responses will say 'we need more burning' - it's much more complicated than that. We need a mixed landscape again, where we share it with the other living things that help manage it. 'Greenies' see it as nature to be left alone, rednecks see it as a resource to do whatever they like with. They're both fundamentalists.