Friday, March 29, 2024

ALTERNATIVE VIEW: Fires are fine, farming isn’t?

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While I’m writing this before the election, you’ll likely be reading it after the result is announced. I trust you are relaxed about that result and are looking forward to three years of wealth, happiness and fulfilled election promises.
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On a more serious note, I really enjoy the Mackenzie Basin country and have for decades. I’ve travelled serious distances to shoot, fish and camp there.

I can also remember around 30 years ago, the place was a desert covered by rabbits and the noxious weed hieracium. No one was remotely interested in the area. There was nary a murmur from the ubiquitous Fish and Game, Forest and Bird or that cacophonic fringe group that is Greenpeace.

Then farmers wanted to introduce myxomatosis to control rabbits. The cries from those groups were thunderous. If the virus is introduced it will kill rabbits. You can’t fool Fish and Game and the team can you?

It gets better. As a result of myxomatosis, there will be ferrets and stoats in abundance eating dead rabbits. After the rabbits are all dead, those pests will chase the venerable Black Stilts, an endangered bird.

So, what the so-called environmental groups were telling me is that it is okay to have the Mackenzie as a desert plagued by an army of rabbits and noxious weeds. It isn’t okay to kill those rabbits and regenerate the Basin.

Now that the rabbits are gone and the Black Stilt has survived, everyone has suddenly and passionately fallen in love with Mackenzie. An area regenerated by farmers who killed the rabbits and removed the hieracium. However, it seems that farmers are the enemy to those protestors based in Wellington, who wouldn’t have a clue.

I would conservatively describe their actions as hypocritical.

We now have another enemy in the Mackenzie in the form of fire. Fire would have destroyed native plants and animals with infinitely more surety than a centre pivot would.

There have been two fires in short order burning in total 8500 hectares of land and Department of Conservation (DOC) estate. DOC has told us that more fires are likely.

I find that situation appalling. So far, by the grace of God no one has been killed. With fires becoming more frequent that will, inevitably, change.

There has been devastation to property, native vegetation and animals, yet I haven’t heard anything from any of the so-called environmental groups. It seems hypocritical. Fires are fine, farming isn’t.

Mind you, the commentary on the fires has been at times ridiculously stupid.

Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage, never one to either let scientific fact get in the way of a good story or resist the urge to criticise farmers, hit the headlines running.

Her statement that “farmers were just looking for free grazing” in the wake of Federated Farmers suggesting that DOC wasn’t state of the art when it came to pasture management was ignorant, offensive and insulting.

Feds high country chair Rob Stokes described Sage’s comments as a “cheap shot”. I’d say cheap shot is a reasoned and conservative description.

I’m aware that both Feds and local farmers have been telling the DOC and Sage for years about the fire risk created by their management of the Mackenzie Basin. They’ve been ignored.

Feds went on to say that some areas of the DOC estate were inappropriate for livestock but that in other areas “low numbers of sheep and cattle can keep combustible grass, scrub and immature wilding pine levels down”.

That’s what happens in Australia, the UK and the US but we seem to be happy going in the opposite direction.

I’ve had some good mates in DOC over the years and have respected the organisation. That respect is wearing thin.

Talking to a farmer mate from the area and on condition of anonymity he was livid.

His statements included: “DOC has no ability to manage land,” and “they just want to lock the gate and bugger off.” Most telling was “DOC needs to adopt a partnership approach and not that of what we know is best.”

DOC operations manager Katrina Morrow was quoted as saying that “grazed tussock still burns very well”. What an idiotic statement. Yes, it does burn, but not at the intensity of non-grazed tussocks.

I believe it was Prof Derrick Moot of Lincoln University who told Farmers Weekly that grazing reduced the fire risk. That fact is recognised internationally, so why is DoC so blinded?

The Mackenzie fires need to be a wake-up call for the next government. The DOC’s non-grazing regime isn’t working and I remain unconvinced they have any expertise in this area. 

They need to change and be open-minded and consultative. They also need a minister who heeds scientific advice and is not blinkered against farmers.

Finally, may I respectfully suggest that irrigation could be the answer. Green grass doesn’t burn.

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