Knowing how species respond to fire regimes is essential for ecologically sustainable management. This axiom raises two important questions: (1) what knowledge is the most important to develop and ...(2) to what extent can current research methods deliver that knowledge? We identify three areas of required knowledge: (i) a mechanistic understanding of species’ responses to fire regimes; (ii) knowledge of how the spatial and temporal arrangement of fires influences the biota; and (iii) an understanding of interactions of fire regimes with other processes. We review the capacity of empirical research to address these knowledge gaps, and reveal many limitations. Manipulative experiments are limited by the number and scope of treatments that can be applied, natural experiments are limited by treatment availability and confounding factors, and longitudinal studies are difficult to maintain, particularly due to unplanned disturbance events. Simulation modelling is limited by the quality of the underlying empirical data and by uncertainty in how well model structure represents reality. Due to the constraints on large-scale, long-term research, the potential for management experiments to inform adaptive management is limited. Rather than simply recommending adaptive management, we define a research agenda to maximise the rate of learning in this difficult field. This includes measuring responses at a species level, building capacity to implement natural experiments, undertaking simulation modelling, and judicious application of experimental approaches. Developing ecologically sustainable fire management practices will require sustained research effort and a sophisticated research agenda based on carefully targeting appropriate methods to address critical management questions.
Agencies charged with nature conservation and protecting built‐assets from fire face a policy dilemma because management that protects assets can have adverse impacts on biodiversity. Although ...conservation is often a policy goal, protecting built‐assets usually takes precedence in fire management implementation. To make decisions that can better achieve both objectives, existing trade‐offs must first be recognized, and then policies implemented to manage multiple objectives explicitly. We briefly review fire management actions that can conflict with biodiversity conservation. Through this review, we find that common management practices might not appreciably reduce the threat to built‐assets but could have a large negative impact on biodiversity. We develop a framework based on decision theory that could be applied to minimize these conflicts. Critical to this approach is (1) the identification of the full range of management options and (2) obtaining data for evaluating the effectiveness of those options for achieving asset protection and conservation goals. This information can be used to compare explicitly the effectiveness of different management choices for conserving species and for protecting assets, given budget constraints. The challenge now is to gather data to quantify these trade‐offs so that fire policy and practices can be better aligned with multiple objectives.
The interaction between fire and the environment is extremely complex. The Department of Sustainability and is taking a risk-based approach to bushfire management to minimise the impact of major ...bushfires on human life, property and the environment, and to maintain or improve ecosystem resilience. Since 2006, the Department has been undertaking flora and fauna monitoring and has established several programs including pre and post-fire flora monitoring,
The introduction and establishment of a new and markedly different environment within a long established natural system provides an excellent opportunity to study the principles of adaptation and ...colonisation by native species. In Australia, an example is furnished by the conversion of large areas of native eucalypt forests to mono-cultured plantations of Monterey Pine (Pinus radiata). The principal aim of this study was to assess which species of native mammals, birds and higher plants are able to utilise or occupy such plantations. Successional aspects of community structure, and colonisation in pine forest systems, were investigated by considering stands of different ages. A variety of adjacent native eucalypt forests provided controls and indicated the range of potential colonisers. Various habitats in both forest types were studied with regard to potential nest sites and availability of food, in order to determine those habitats most favourable for mammals and birds. The effect, on wildlife, of clearing eucalypt forests, but leaving forest remnants along gullies, was also assessed.
The abundance and distribution of reptiles and amphibians inhabiting tropical monsoonal wetlands in Kakadu National Park, northern Australia, were monitored between late 1979 and 1982. Seasonal ...trends in species richness, and the influence of various environmental attributes (including those caused by feral ungulates) on species distribution patterns were also examined. These wetlands support a high proportion of the amphibian species known from the Park, but are of less importance to reptiles. Within the wetlands, the structurally more complex forested ‘margins’ support many more species than the treeless floodplains. Amphibian species distributions seem to be influenced primarily by elevation, through its effects on soil moisture and flooding levels, while reptile distribution patterns reflect a more complex set of environmental factors, with structural attributes (e.g. vegetation height structure and cover, refuge abundance, leaf litter cover and depth, extent of flooding) being of prime importance. Feral buffalo and pigs, through their grazing, trampling and wallowing, may considerably influence such structural attributes and change the duration and extent of water lie, and thus indirectly affect species distribution patterns. Current buffalo culling programmes provide an opportunity to monitor vegetation and faunal changes, and quantify feral animal impact post facto.
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A comparative study of mammalian populations in plantations of Pinus radiatu of different ages, and in adjacent native eucalypt forests, was carried out in Gippsland, Victoria. Species richness was ...lower and the proportion of introduced species was higher in plantations, particularly in the younger stands where no over-storey vegetation existed. Certain small ground-dwelling species were favoured at different plantation ages, depending on their food and refuge requirements. Larger ground-dwelling herbivores and carnivores were common in pine plantations, although feeding areas for herbivorous species in middle-aged plantations with a closed canopy were restricted to compartment edges and tracks. Most arboreal herbivores, insectivores, nectivores and tree-hollow users were uncommon in plantations, and in such areas were restricted to retained native forest: their long-term survival in pine plantations is open to question. Some arboreal species with relatively broad food and refuge requirements were able to exist within older plantation compartments which supported some understorey shrub vegetation.
In pine plantations, mammalian species richness was greatest near edges adjacent to native forest, and where remnants of native forest and a mosaic of pine stands of various ages existed (i.e. a "plantation complex"). Windrows in first-rotation plantations may be important refuge habitats for some of the smaller native mammals, for such species were absent from young second-rotation plantations which lacked windrows.
The effect of the decisions which were taken by the representatives of the various European countries participating in the Berlin Conference of 1884, had far-reaching effects on the political and ...socio-economic development on the African continent during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The full extent of the effects of these decisions are comparable to what happened in Africa after 1948. Although comparable, the character of the two periods differed drastically from each other. The most significant difference was that the period after 1884 was initially characterised by colonisation, while the period after 1948 was marked by de-colonisation.The continued presence of the South African administration in Namibia had a ignificant influence on the outcome of political developments in the territory uring the period 1948 to 1989. This administration continued after the Second World War because the trusteeship system which had been set up by the United Nations (UN) in 1946 was not accepted by the South African Government. They had been administering the region in terms of a C-mandate which had been handed down by the League of Nations after the First World War. The consequence of this continued administration was that the diplomatic and political events in the territory were dominated by resistance in one form or another during the period 1948 to 1989. This resistance was offered by members of the indigenous resistance community who were opposed to the continued South African administration of Namibia which lasted until the gaining of Namibian independence in 1989.• One of the many diplomatic and political features which characterised the period from 1948 to 1989, and which had a distinct influence on the course of 2 events in Namibia included the implementation of the domestic South African policy of racial segregation. This policy was commonly referred to as apartheid. It was implemented in Namibia by the South African administration together with other restrictive legislation, which included the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950 and the Riotous Assembly Act of 1956 as an attempt by the South African Government to control the outcome of all political developments in the region." In 1966, the UN terminated the mandate by which the South African Government was managing the territory. The unwillingness of the South African administration to divest itself from Namibia after the termination of this mandate gave impetus to the rise of popular indigenous resistance. This resistance was aimed at achieving both political recognition of the recently formed indigenous political parties and independence from South African administrative control. Although this administration ecognised the rise of African nationalism, it was not willing to recognise this ise in nationalism to the extent that it could result in the indigenous inhabitants of Namibia acquiring political power. This view of the South African administration also expedited the escalation in indigenous resistance and the formation of the South West Africa People's Organisation (SWAPO), one of the many indigenous political parties in Namibia, which would play a leading role in offering popular Namibian resistance.A further example of growing popular Namibian resistance towards the South African administration can be highlighted in the manner in which Katjavivi (1988) refers to the South African administered elections of 1972 and 1973 as controlled elections.
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