World water week shock: Melbourne’s water logged illegally : Melbourne Indymedia

The Central Highlands Alliance Inc
22nd August
World water week shock: Melbourne’s water logged illegally

World Water Week has commenced with the shocking discovery of illegal logging in Melbourne’s most important water supply catchment.

Spokesperson Sarah Rees said; “As the state’s dams run dry and the Bracks government is within weeks of announcing water restrictions, the discovery of illegal logging in the Thomson catchment is unforgivable.”

Over the weekend, environment groups made the discovery between Melbourne’s two most important water catchments, the Upper Yarra and the Thomson, where logging has ripped the heart out of Melbourne’s water and violated a law designed to protect water levels and water quality.

“The Thomson River is a declared special water supply catchment,” President of Lawyers for Forests Inc Vanessa Bleyer said.

“As a result, logging is banned from May to December every year. The discovered logging has occurred in the catchment during the prohibited period and is a breach of the law.”

“Prosecutions must follow. It is outrageous that Melbourne’s citizens face fines if they enter catchments and yet the government is allowing unlawful logging to take place without penalty.”

Melbourne Doctor and Co-ordinator of Doctors for Native Forests Inc, Dr Suresh Pathy said,“Clean water across the world is the basis of human health, bacterial contamination is a serious risk posed by industrial logging in catchments and must be prevented.”

Logging is forbidden during the wettest months to reduce the risk of dirty water and contamination, because the sediment caused by logging reduces the effectiveness of chlorination allowing waterborne diseases to thrive, such as Giardia.

The Central Highlands Alliance are sourcing logging coupe plans as the coupe does not appear on any maps, additionally rendering the logging unauthorised.

“PaperlinX who produce reflex copy paper take most of the wood from our precious water catchments. It’s pressure form PaperlinX which has caused successive Governments to turn a blind eye to this destruction. The time has come for this to end and move companies such as this one into the growing plantation resource” Ms Rees said.

“Scientists and Melbourne Water warn that we will be using our entire supply by 2012. Logging our catchments is losing Melburnians 1000 litres of clean drinking water every second.”

The Department of Sustainability and Environment can’t be trusted with our precious water catchments. Premier Bracks must now protect Melbourne’s catchments from woodchipping.”

New research by The Central Highlands Alliance Inc to be released tomorrow shows that Victorians could be saving a Maroondah dam full of water every year if logging stopped in the Thomson catchment but losses will double if logging continues.

Mr. Beatties solution to the lack of rain caused by land-clearing is to build more dams. After all, it is logical, the more dams we build the more it will rain

Can we get some more info. How much area/where/when?. Has thwaites said anything, what about the dse?.
Have they finished the coupe?.

Yes, they've finished the coupe and all logs have been hauled away. Bracks/Thwaites have yet to formally respond.

For more details and references for all of these figures please visit http://www.tcha.org.au/water.html <http://www.tcha.org.au/water.html>

Please find attached: coupe location.png is a close up of the area in the above map again circled in red and the coupe coloured in red indicating where the coupe is across the catchment boundary ie the blue line

Also, more info on the following is available via tcha site:

(i) Appendix R.pdf – Which is from the Central Highlands Forest Management Plan which indicates timber harvesting seasonal closure between 1st May and 30th November.

(ii) Thompsoncatchment.png– is a detailed map of the Thompson catchment (note the diagonal cross hatched area is the catchment) the red circle shows where the logged area is

The detailed on the ground photos sent earlier show just how much disturbance there is to the soil

(iv) the Thompson beyond.jpg is a helicopter photo we took of another clear fell logging coupe in the Thompson catchment which was done during the correct time of the year but which is still having a major effect on the water run off into the dam.

The governments standard response is that only a small amount i.e. 0.3% of the catchment is logged each year and it therefore has little impact on water yield. (since 1988 the average area logged for the Thompson is 143.8ha per year and 92% of that is Ash forest)

What we have found is that most of the rain fall in the catchment falls in approximately 1/3 of the catchment area and this is where almost all of the logging is concentrated.

Scientific studies show that clear fell logging effects water yield by up to 50% for up to 150 years and 0.3% i.e. (143.8ha per year) over the last 40 years of clear fell logging history in the area becomes very significant.

I.e. based on the high rain fall area being logged and water loss to re growing forests it has been estimated that 1000 litres per second or the volume of the Maroondah dam (20 000 Mega Litres) is being lost to logging each year.

Most of the wood is going to woodchips to make paper and the royalty is estimated at 1.8 Million Dollars per year while the economic value of the lost water is approximately $15 Million dollars per year

(v) Thompsoncoupes.jpg If you are having difficulty getting your head around this take a look at the google earth satellite image attached showing some of the logging coupes in the Thompson Catchment approximately 4 years ago - add another 450 ha

I would rather have the limited, scattered harvesting and regrowth in the catchments than risk a large scale severe fire in them. Severe fire that initiates a large scale regrowth event is the single biggest threat to Melbourne's water supply catchments.

It wouldn't matter where the logging was done they would find something to complain about. If more select logging was done we wouldn't have as much problems with losing a valuable resource to bush fires.

The posting about the illegal logging is so full of untrue claims it's laughable. When did it finish? They don't know...it's quite conceivable that it was logged at the right time. Oh I love the one about "we've worked out that most of the rainfall occurrs in the 1/3 of the catchment where the logging occurs"...yeah right...would love to see the results of your extensive studies on that one. No mention of the royalty value of the sawlogs taken out of the Thomson Valley....ooooh that might put a dent into your argument eh Lauren??

Perhaps this is the start of a campaign for the greens prior to the election which will be held before the logging commences in the catchments this year. No blockade value for you there!!!

I suspect your the same person. You are so wrong about logging and fires. Regrowth burns at a much greater intensity than mature forest and a mosaic of regrowth through the mature forest will more likely see us lose the lot. Not even D.S. would try to support your arguments.
D.S we would expect to hear that from you, I was wondering how long it would take you to post your industry propaganda.
What makes you think the coupe was finished in the allowed season. Ive heard and will check this out tonight that it wasnt even on the W.U.P. . Nobody cares about the few dollars the timber earns in royalties when forest management costs the state more. As for the rainfall maps , they were made for victoria years ago and have been updated many time by many people(B.O.M, C.S.I.R.O. and D.S.E.) but I suppose you will say that the scientists who made them are just pulling an election stunt or some other BS. Get with the science that says what you are doing in our catchments is wrong.
Your arguments are just bullshit industry propaganda that no educated person would believe.

Touch a nerve did I Greg? The claim was made by Sarah that the coupe was logged out of season and now you're saying that it wasn't even on the TRP?? Can't wait to see the proof of that one. We won't hear from you again on this with proof besause there just isn't any. You're going to have to do better than that I think.

Greg, I thought this thread was about water. Severe bushfires are the biggest single threat to Melbourne's water catchments! Period. Without the mosaic of age classes and maintenance of access through the catchments a single major fire could wipe out the catchments within a few weeks. Although not in catchments, the 2002/03 fires proved this with more than 1 million hectares burnt within a period of 6 to 8 weeks. A major fire that triggers a massive regrowth event is by far the greatest threat to both the quality and future quantity of Melbourne's water. Indeed, the effects of the greater water use of regrowth from the 1939 Black Firday fires are still being reflected in catchment stream flows. The annual scattered harvesting in Melbourne's catchments is equivalent to 0.0018% of the total catchment area (reference avialable). If the community is serious about optimising water production from its forestes catchments, it shoudl be embracing active forest management. As well as taking advantage of opportunities to manipulate stream flows through harvesting, the community needs to maintain a skilled workforce best able to manage the critical fire threat.

The discussion of the 1939 fires is an interesting one. The industry refer to the 1939 fires as a naturally occuring event that produced a landscape of even aged forests. The argument in support of clearfelling is using this as well. However, the 1939 fire and the regeneration of parts of the forest were far from natural. The 1939 fires were found by a Royal Commission to be human induced. Much of the fire was caused by deliberately lit fires such as those lit by cattlemen to burn forest understorey to allow for grazing and access. These individual fires where fanned by the intense weather conditions of Black Friday to become one of the worst bushfire disasters the state has ever experienced. Following the fire, the timber and pulp industry logged the burnt forest for 20 years, removing much of the past biological legacy of the pre-1939 forest. And now, we have this obscure myth that big catastrophic fires are 'natural' and that all ash forests are even aged. One just has to look at early photos of the Black Spur to see that this was not the case and that this creates a context to justify clearfelling forests and keep them in a 'degraded' state in line with past mismanagement.

A note for people - Read up on the literature out there and become informed. It is widely accpeted by the scientific community that logging in the Thomson is to the detriment on the catchment and increases the fire risk. Don't engage with industry protagonists - they are just a waste of time - but concentrate your effort to engaging with the community on these issues.