Proposed TRP Amendment - Elizabeth Ninnis - Resident Toolangi
To the Board of Directors,
Vicforests
I have enjoyed part time residence of a 140 acre property at Myers Creek Road, Toolangi for over 20 years. During this period I have spent time each week in Melbourne for my employment as a university lecturer in Design History.
By coincidence, I have a number of friends who were closely involved with this area prior to my coming here, and regularly stayed in Strathvea Guesthouse on Myers Creek Road. I also knew the family of the director of the original development of the Potato Research Station and have heard many stories of these early times. Over the years, I have come to know a range of long-term local residents, who have contributed to my knowledge of Toolangi and the Myers Creek Valley, the surrounding environment and its natural beauties. Through these sources as well as from my own historical research, I have been provided with a rich background to the area.
I appreciate that for most of the 20th century, following the early activities of the 19th century timber cutters, the Myers Creek valley has been regarded as an area of outstanding natural beauty, leading to the preservation of the Myers Creek Reserve. It was a central focus for tourist visitation during the interwar years when Healesville played a prominent role as a country resort. In the devastation to surrounding areas caused by the 1939 bushfires, this cool south-facing valley survived unburnt. It has remained since then, sheltered by the backdrop of Mt St Leonard and the maturing of the forest on its slopes, which has been gradually returning to its original state as a cool and moisture laden area, rich in bio-diversity and wildlife.
In our early years in the area, we befriended John McVea, the former owner of Strathvea guesthouse. He told us of a major landslide which had occurred in the Myers Creek valley in front of his property, following a period of extremely heavy rainfall. We have since received official notification and advice about landslip, which is a characteristic of the steep slopes within this region. Any plans for building or individual tree removal must take place within strict parameters. We have felt reassured by the continuity and stability of the forest cover, which has remained undisturbed since 1939.
We have also witnessed the project to develop the Great Alpine Trail, which goes all the way from Healesville to Cooktown. It was a long-term expansive vision, reaching fruition in 1988, the bi-centenary year. The initial stages of the trail start at Donelly’s Weir, continuing up through the pristine mountain ash forest above the Myers Creek Reserve to Mt St Leonard, providing yet another significant reason to preserve and treasure this area.
Throughout the recent long years of drought, we have always been able to draw our water supply from the Myers Creek, as do many other local residents, with properties along its banks, for domestic use, for agriculture and for an increasing number of guesthouses. We have always appreciated this continuous water source and have had it tested for potability. Restrictions have been continually applied throughout this period, and we have been continually updated about the state of water flow. Fortunately, the creek has never dried up, providing a valued contributory to the Watts River and on into the Yarra. We are certain that this is possible due to the surrounding undisturbed catchment area.
In the summers of 2006 (January) and 2007, we faced a number of serious and imminent bushfire threats from the North West, and each year spent numerous weeks in preparation and on bushfire alert. Each time we were spared and the cool forests of Myers Creek valley remained.
Behind our property, the steep bushland sloping up from Chum Creek Road to Lowes Road has undergone fuel reduction burning over the years in a number of different sections. This has occurred twice in the area directly behind us, which has been acknowledged as a lanscape of rare natural biodiversity, so close to Melbourne, with recommendation that fuel reduction burning should be avoided here, as it was too great a threat to this fragile and complex ecosystem. Yet the repeated burning went ahead, placing human demand above that of our dwindling natural environment.
On Black Saturday, we experienced the great fear of two approaching bushfires - one burning furiously up from Chum Creek in the dry more open forest, and the other bearing down from Murrindindi. On the night of February 7, from a viewing point near the Maroondah Reservoir, I heard an SES leader instruct that Myers Creek Road was the only accessible route through to Kinglake. The fire could only burn slowly in the cool old growth forest valley. The two major fire fronts from Kilmore and Murrindindi continued to threaten this area for over three weeks, until finally quenched by rain on Tuesday March 3. During those weeks, various residents of the Myers Creek Valley, including my husband, continued to fight to protect their properties, and no homes were lost. Our property and the adjoining property of Greenhills retained substantial areas of unburnt bushland, providing a small refuge for wildlife within an unspeakably large swathe of destruction, surrounding the Myers Creek Valley on all sides.
Since then a year has passed, and the huge trauma of which we are all aware has gradually receded, in different ways, depending upon the depth of tragedy or loss that has been experienced. Gradually we have witnessed the slow recovery of the bush, watching and listening for the return of familiar wildlife and continually aware of what species have not yet reappeared. The majority of the burnt areas within the valley itself and on the adjoining slopes of Mount St Leonard did not experience a crown fire due to the dense cooler forest and the unbroken canopy overhead. Consequently its regeneration has been so much faster than on the Western face of the Chum Creek/Lowes Road area.
I am now deeply concerned to find that a vastly increased number of logging coupes are proposed for the Central highlands and other regions that have been decimated already by the Black Saturday Fires. Of particular significance to me are the four adjacent logging coupes that are proposed for the West-facing slope of Mount St Leonard, directly abutting the Myers Creek Reserve. I am incredulous that further threat should be imposed on these fragile areas at such a time, by our own government forest industry, when choice is possible, unlike the unstoppable forces of the weather and the fires.
Over the years we have always considered with relief the cool south facing slopes of the Myers Creek Valley and the bushland between the Reserve and the Maroondah Catchment to be an area of refuge for wildlife, such as the endangered Sooty Owl and rare Greater Glider, secure in the belief that at least this small area of habitat would remain undisturbed. We have believed that this area between the Myers Creek Reserve and the Maroondah catchment was set aside as a continuous protected zone, and that the West facing slope of Mt St Leonard was to remain a secure environment above the headwaters of Myers Creek, providing a permanent backdrop of undisturbed natural beauty for the larger expanse of the Yarra Valley, while obviously enhancing the tourist value of the whole region.
I find it unthinkable and totally unacceptable that this area should now be under threat of decimation by the process of clear fell logging, jeopardising future water quality, land stability, fragile eco systems, and the growing tourist industry, as well as contributing to greater risk of fire, by opening up and drying out the bush. Such an action would also be making a significant and long-term contribution to the process of global warming, at a time when governments are duty bound to take preventative steps against it.
Yours sincerely,
Elizabeth
Elizabeth Ninnis