"BURN, BOBOYAN, BURN"

On Tuesday 2 June and Wednesday 3 June, Namadgi National Park with help from the ACT Bushfire Service, volunteer BFS brigades, Canberra Urban Park Services, ACT Parks and Conservation Service units, ACT Forests, ACT Emergency Services, the ACT Fire Brigade, and Emergency Services Bureau, successfully conducted a series of 5 high intensity prescription fires in the Boboyan Pine Forest, along with with some smaller burns to tidy up specific areas. In all, over 93 hectares of pine slash was burnt.

The aim of these fires was to burn out the slash, killing any pine seeds, and leaving a suitable ash bed for regeneration of native vegetation. Additionally, such a fire was expected to produce extreme intensities, and there would be immense value in cycling as many fire crews as possible through the event to allow a ‘safe’ experience with fire of a type that, in a wildfire setting would prove life-threatening.

Steve Welch, the Namadgi ranger for the Gudgenby area and the officer now charged with the day to day running of the Boboyan pines project, stated:
I’m sure the intensity of these burns surprised many of the people present and as Ian McArthur stated in the debrief; “ these burns took place on days when the maximum temperature reached was 15 degrees and the humidity was at least 50%, can you imagine them on a Total Fire Ban day?”

On behalf of Namadgi, Steve would like to thank everybody for their efforts, in particular:

• Ian McArthur and Arthur Sayer - for running the operation in a very safe and efficient manner;
• Rick McRae - for excellent weather information;
• David Tong from the Rivers Volunteer Brigade and Andrew Robertson from Headquarters Volunteer Brigade; who did their utmost to ensure that everybody’s appetites were satiated;
• Ann Connolly and Peter Galvin for their work with the prescription planning.

THE BOBOYAN PINES PROJECT

THE BURN

BOBOYAN BURNS