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Hi folks
I kinda dropped off this forum for a few weeks. Here's why.
Our wet season (monsoon) flipped to dry season which is the busiest time of year for us in the bush. Even though what happens in North Australia is not really relevant to 'Life in the Wilderness' north of the equator I thought I'd update you on what this entails.
First we will receive no more water until November. What have stored in the tanks will have to last now... for drinking washing irrigation and firefighting. Of course we can go suck out of creeks if we need to for non-potable water.
Second the weeds are out and I've got about four weeks to treat them all before they drop seed and multiply hundred fold... our own property remains virtually weed free, and I work bloody hard to keep it that way. Just a few weeks back a Kangaroo dropped dead close to the house. The Boy took me to the body. After a few weeks it was well decomposed and a perfect patch of weeds were springing from where its stomach had been! Thats how they get onto the property!
But the biggest job is fire preparation. Last week I organised our district fire preparation meeting and we developed our annual fire management strategy. This involves maintenance and grading of our fire trails and fire breaks, property tracks and then strategic boundary burns and fuel reduction burns...
As the grass fuel dries quickly there is a very limited window of time to conduct these burns before the risk of fire 'getting away from us' gets to great.
But without these strategic burns around our district, we'll stand no chance of fighting the wildfires that will come later in the year and our beautiful forests and wildlife will be toasted...
So its a mad time. I'll post some pics of our control burns... some look pretty impressive. Next weekend we'll be lighting a continuous fire front 8km long... All as necessary conservation practice
Alan
I kinda dropped off this forum for a few weeks. Here's why.
Our wet season (monsoon) flipped to dry season which is the busiest time of year for us in the bush. Even though what happens in North Australia is not really relevant to 'Life in the Wilderness' north of the equator I thought I'd update you on what this entails.
First we will receive no more water until November. What have stored in the tanks will have to last now... for drinking washing irrigation and firefighting. Of course we can go suck out of creeks if we need to for non-potable water.
Second the weeds are out and I've got about four weeks to treat them all before they drop seed and multiply hundred fold... our own property remains virtually weed free, and I work bloody hard to keep it that way. Just a few weeks back a Kangaroo dropped dead close to the house. The Boy took me to the body. After a few weeks it was well decomposed and a perfect patch of weeds were springing from where its stomach had been! Thats how they get onto the property!
But the biggest job is fire preparation. Last week I organised our district fire preparation meeting and we developed our annual fire management strategy. This involves maintenance and grading of our fire trails and fire breaks, property tracks and then strategic boundary burns and fuel reduction burns...
As the grass fuel dries quickly there is a very limited window of time to conduct these burns before the risk of fire 'getting away from us' gets to great.
But without these strategic burns around our district, we'll stand no chance of fighting the wildfires that will come later in the year and our beautiful forests and wildlife will be toasted...
So its a mad time. I'll post some pics of our control burns... some look pretty impressive. Next weekend we'll be lighting a continuous fire front 8km long... All as necessary conservation practice
Alan