Logging

A letter from Little Red Toolangi Treehouse campsite: Water from a wet forest

A river’s gentle white noise soothes sleep as stars turn through trees, the gift of water - so so special in our dry land. This is the Yea River, a short dawn walk through soft treeferns. It was for hours like this, a gentle though persistent presence to sleep with, till the forest stirred from breeze and leaves countless grow the white noise into a stirring celebration of water, sun and life that is this place - a ‘Great Forest’.

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Victorian government knowingly driving Leadbeater's Possum to extinction, say scientists

Two distinguished environmental scientists accused the Victorian Government of forestry policies knowingly designed to drive Leadbeater's Possum, one of the two fauna emblems of Victoria, to extinction.

In a letter to sciencemag.org, the publication of the Australian Association for the Advancement of Science, Professors David Lindenmayer and Hugh Possingham say, "Government-sanctioned legal logging of the reserve system will significantly increase the chance of extinction of Leadbeater's possum. To the best of our knowledge, and despite state and national threatened species legislation, this is the first time an Australian government has taken calculated actions to substantially reduce the viability of an IUCN-listed endangered species with full knowledge of the likely consequences." (Read full letter reproduced at end of this article)

Petition: Defer the Bill that would lock-in long-term native forest logging | Help Save Leadbeater's Possum | My Environment Appeal 2013 Leadbeater's Possum | Ethical paper pledge

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Premier Campbell Newman opens up logging destruction in Queensland native forests

The Queensland Premier and Government have reopened logging in native forests with 2 million hectares of state forest being made initially available for environmental destruction. This will impact on habitat for endangered species, biodiversity and the huge carbon stores locked up in mature forests. Mature forests also tend to hold more moisture and are less susceptible to bushfire, and absorb more water during floods - providing a natural flood mitigation service, a natural service that is all the more needed with the increase in rainfall and extreme whether events with climate change. See Leaked Document (PDF).

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Forest Witness Tasmania - Groundswell Tasmania - What's happening on the ground in the north east of this wild state

Forest Witness – North East Tasmania – 26/10/12

This week in the North East of Tasmania, activists from the group Groundswell documented the ongoing destruction of forests located in independently verified High Conservation Value (HCV) forests.

NL115H is an 80 Hectare logging coupe, on the Western foothills of Ben Lomond National Park at Fisher’s Tier, only 40mins drive from the Tasmanian city of Launceston. It has been left out of the 430,000Ha of ENGO nominated reserve, but is within the 572,000ha of independently verified HCV forest.

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Harvey Norman furniture tagged as destructive to at-risk native forests

This week, Harvey Norman stores across Australia have been visited as part of an innovative marketing campaign to give customers the real story of where their new native forest furniture is sourced.

The Last Stand has been campaigning to highlight the role Harvey Norman plays in the destruction of our native forests. Their native Australian furniture and flooring is sourced from high conservation value forests at risk in New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia and Tasmania.

“If Harvey Norman won’t tell the truth to their customers we will” said Nicola Paris from the Last Stand.

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Olive branch offered on Ta Ann markets campaign in Tasmania

Environment groups have offered to suspend their markets campaign in Japan for one month while forest peace talks proceed, on the condition that logging ceases in the 572,000 ha of verified high conservation value forests whilst negotiations about protecting them take place.

“It’s a moratorium for a moratorium,” said Peg Putt of Markets for Change.

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Tasmanian tree sitter reaches 100 days.

Media Release March 23rd 2012 Miranda Gibson has been at the top of a tree in Tasmania’s threatened forest for 100 days. Ms Gibson’s extraordinary effort began in mid-december when she climbed to the top of the tree vowing to remain on her tree-top platform until the area was protected, as it should have been according to the Intergovernmental Agreement. Miranda celebrated her 100th day amid snow.

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Forest Rescue heighten protest actions to save forests - however many arrests

Gerry Georgatos
Forest Rescue Australia (FRA) has heightened its protest actions halting Warrup logging on an almost daily basis - however at the price of arrests. A Forest Products Commission (FPC) spokeswoman confirmed that protestors had entered work areas on three separate days in the last ten days and on two occasions had locked themselves on to two logging machines while work continued in other parts of the operation.

On Monday 19, FRA protestors entered the Warrup logging area and one protestor managed to lock himself on to a logging machine for 15 hours.

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Tasmanian tree sitter launches Japanese awareness campaign

March 13th Still Wild Still Threatened Press Release Today Still Wild Still Threatened spokesperson Miranda Gibson is launching a campaign in Japan. Miranda Gibson has been living at the top of a tree, known as The Observer Tree, since December 14 2011 and her action has received international attention.

The innovative campaign to outreach the Observer Tree to the people of Japan will raise awareness of the threatened forests of Tasmania.

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Loggers intimidate and assault activists in Warrup Forest

Forest Rescue Media Release

14 March 2012

Forest Rescue has been waging a Non Violent Direct Action battle with the WA state government's Forest Products Commission (FPC) in order to secure the last remaining Numbat habitat in our southwest - the Warrup Forest near Bridgetown in WA. The forest is one of the last remaining intact colonies of the Numbat, of which less than a thousand remain in the wild. The Numbat was originally found across the whole of southern Australia.

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