First contact: colonial European preconceptions of tropical Queensland rainforest and its people

Birtles, Terry G.

doi:10.1006/jhge.1997.0060

Cited by 10 publications

(9 citation statements)

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“…One earlier map, showing the vegetation at 1890 in the Cowie area, was compiled from survey plans held in the QSA. The surveyors who prepared these plans were instructed in vegetation description by the government botanist Walter Hill (Birtles 1997), and referred to rainforest typically as "dense scrub", and to open forest as "splendid open forest" (Hill 1998). These descriptions were used to allocate vegetation classes similar to those in the 1991-94 and 1945 maps.…”

Section: Study Area and Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cattle, mining or fire? The historical causes of recent contractions of open forest in the wet tropics of Queensland through invasion by rainforest

Hill¹,

Smyth²,

Shipton³

et al. 2001

Pac. Conserv. Biol.

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Changes to Aboriginal fire regimes since European occupation are thought to have affected the range and demographic structure of many vegetation communities. This study shows a contraction by 49% of the area of fireprone open forest through rainforest invasion between 1945 and 1991-94 in the northern wet tropics of Queensland, Australia. Relative Growth Rates (RGR) for open forest areas varied from -0.112 to -0.005. Collaborative historical research with the Aboriginal traditional owners, the Kuku-Yalanji people, investigated possible linkages with alterations to their fire practices. A multiplicity of human impacts is associated with the measured vegetation change, including clearing for agriculture and mining, logging for timber and firewood, and the introduction of cattle and horses. Some rainforest expansion since 1945 represents a recovery following clearing from earlier mining operations. Contraction of open forest through rainforest invasion was most rapid (RGR = -0.124) where there was a continuation of Aboriginal fire management with cattle grazing. The contraction of open forest was nine times slower in an ungrazed area (RGR = -0.005) than in a nearby area grazed by horses (RGR = -0.045). Aboriginal fire regimes may act synergistically with cattle or horse grazing to accelerate the invasion of rainforest into open forest. Management prescriptions currently focus on active fire management to prevent further open forest contraction. However, fire management may have unexpected outcomes when rainforest-open forest dynamics are complicated by recent historical factors such as cattle grazing, logging, and tin mining, and possible synergies between these factors and fire regimes.Managers need to understand the histories of particular sites when formulating plans, and monitor the consequences of their actions to enable an adaptive approach.

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Section: Study Area and Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cattle, mining or fire? The historical causes of recent contractions of open forest in the wet tropics of Queensland through invasion by rainforest

Hill¹,

Smyth²,

Shipton³

et al. 2001

Pac. Conserv. Biol.

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“…The locality known as Prior's Pocket was surveyed in 1885 as the site for the town of Atherton (Birtles 1982, p. 48). The written record of the early settlement of the Atherton district is highly developed, settlement having taken place there about 30 years later than in the Big Scrub (see, for example, Bolton 1963;Birtles 1982Birtles , 1997a. The Atherton Tableland also has a substantial ecological and palaeoecological record, and its pattern of palaeoenvironmental change is probably similar to that of the Big Scrub.…”

Section: Analogous Areasmentioning

confidence: 95%

The 'Grasses' of the Big Scrub District, North-eastern New South Wales: Their recent history, spatial distribution and origins

Stubbs¹

2001

Australian Geographer

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A feature of the pre-European landscape of the sub-tropical Richmond River district of north-eastern New South Wales was a large expanse of rainforest known as the Big Scrub. In and around the Big Scrub were small patches of grassland and grassy open-forest, known locally as 'grasses'. These were often given individual names, which indicated their importance in the early timber-based economy of this generally grassless district for camping and depasturing working stock. Historical records enable a reconstruction of the distribution of 56 named 'grasses', and also allow some inferences to be made about their botany and ecology. The 'grasses' appear to be natural features of the landscape, mainly relict areas following invasion of the late Pleistocene open-forest vegetation by rainforest, following sea level rise, during the Holocene. A toponymic study of the use of the term 'grass' in the Richmond River district is also included.

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“…Mangrove forests were inhabited by dangerous and unfamiliar animals [68] and dangerous indigenous populations (Section 4.2), so were variously described in 16 articles (28% of all ecosystem disservice articles) between 1823 and 1883 as "dark", "gloomy", "fetid", "dismal", and a site of "melancholy". This was an important ecosystem disservice that discouraged exploration of mangroves, until they could be colonized [68] by conversion to agricultural development [69].…”

Section: Mangroves As Dark and Gloomymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…As most colonial explorers describe their travels along the coast by ship, mangrove forests provide a backdrop with which to observe initial contacts between colonial explorers and coastal indigenous communities. Mangrove forests were heavily used by many indigenous communities due to the provisioning ecosystem services described previously, though interactions between these groups in the mangrove zone meant that this was perceived by colonial writers as an ecosystem disservice of mangroves; mangroves and other forested habitats were viewed as dangerous as they were seen to be the refuge or hiding place of 'dangerous' indigenous communities [69].…”

Section: A Place Of Dangermentioning

confidence: 99%

Ecosystem Services and Disservices of Mangrove Forests: Insights from Historical Colonial Observations

Friess

2016

Forests

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Ecosystem services are now strongly applied to mangrove forests, though they are not a new way of viewing mangrove-people interactions; the benefits provided by such habitats, and the negative interactions (ecosystem disservices) between mangroves and people have guided perceptions of mangroves for centuries. This study quantified the ecosystem services and disservices of mangroves as written by colonial explorers from 1823-1883 through a literature survey of 96 expedition reports and studies. Ecosystem disservices were most commonly discussed (60%), with settlers considering mangroves as reservoirs of diseases such as malaria, with wide-ranging implications, such as the global drainage of wetlands in the 19th-20th centuries. Multiple ecosystem services were discussed, especially provisioning services for export, representing colonial views of new lands as ripe for economic use. Interestingly, regulating services of mangroves such as erosion control and sediment accretion that are a focus of much contemporary research were recognized as early as 1865. This study shows that the ecosystem service paradigm has a long history in mangroves. We should not underestimate mangrove ecosystem disservices, and how contemporary perceptions of mangroves may be influenced by such historical viewpoints. Archival materials provide a rich resource to study human-environment interactions, and how they change through time.

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First contact: colonial European preconceptions of tropical Queensland rainforest and its people

Cited by 10 publications

References 0 publications

Cattle, mining or fire? The historical causes of recent contractions of open forest in the wet tropics of Queensland through invasion by rainforest

Cattle, mining or fire? The historical causes of recent contractions of open forest in the wet tropics of Queensland through invasion by rainforest

The 'Grasses' of the Big Scrub District, North-eastern New South Wales: Their recent history, spatial distribution and origins

Ecosystem Services and Disservices of Mangrove Forests: Insights from Historical Colonial Observations

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