Fire as a Land-Use Tool in Northeastern Australia

A T MOST places in Australia where there is anything to burn, bush fires are common. It has been said that the continent was made to burn. The combination of droughts, flammable vegetation, and high winds produces seasonal fires that, in the settled areas of the southeast, scourge the land, destroying pasturage, stock, station property, and even lives. In periods of fire hazard the permits required for burning are suspended, meteorological warnings are issued, and fire-fighting equipment is kept always ready. On the cattle ranges of northern Queensland, by contrast, fire is a tool. Men ride through the grass throwing lighted matches into the tussocks and go away only when they are certain that the fire has a good start. These contrasting attitudes toward fire are due in part to differences in the environments, but they also stem from differences in economic development. In the settled south, fire destroys the improvements that have been made on the land; in the north, with its diffuse pioneer economy, there are no improvements to destroy and hence nothing to deter the cattlemen from gaining the small advantage that comes from firing the pasturage. One needs only to turn back a century or so to pioneer days to find similar practices in the south

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