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The blue areas are early fires which are often controlled burns and
the red areas show late fires which can be more intense
wildfires
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Fire and land use
Like many of the remote savanna regions, Arnhem Land has seen
dramatic changes in recent decades in the number and distribution
of people living there. Vast areas of country which were once
inhabited are now almost empty and thus largely unmanaged. In
particular, the western side of Arnhem land, which backs onto
Kakadu National Park, has very few residents. This area, as well as
central Arnhem Land, is very isolated. As road access is limited,
you can only get into this country by walking, or flying in by
helicopter.
Fire regimes
Fire management in these areas then is limited. This has
implications for the ecological health of these parts of Arnhem
land, but also for adjacent land managers. For example, Kakadu
National Park regularly experiences wildfires which come in on very
large fronts having originated in Western Arnhem Land.
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Fire frequency in the Top End of the NT 1993–2000 —
light blue represents a low fire frequency, grading through green
and yellow to red for a high fire frequency
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As shown in this satellite image of fire scars for 1999, fires
in Arnhem land tend to be later inthe year than fire in the western
Top End of the NT. Partly this is because the grassy fuel for fire
in Arnhem Land dries out later in the year than it does further
west, delaying the onset of fires.Another reason, however, is that
because Arnhem Land is less managed, fires tend to start from
naturalcauses, or by accident later in the dry season — when
fuel is tinder-dry.
The frequency of fire also has implications for landscape
health. For example, very frequent fires destroy
many plant communities. As shown in the diagram
above, in Arnhem Land fire frequency is high on the eastern
lowlands and low in the stony escarpment country in the west. As a
whole, however, the western end of the Top End has more frequent
fires that Arnhem Land — much of this is due to controlled
burning.
Fire-management initiatives
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Beginnings of a partnership with business. Adrian Ashley and Danny
Brumel use a quadbike donated by the Rio Tinto Aboriginal
Foundation to carry out early burning near Bulman in central Arnhem
Land. Rio Tinto and other mining companies across northern
Australia are actively engaging with landowners to discuss
collaborative strategies for managing fire in the
savannas
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Various organisations are cooperating in research and planning
in an attempt to start to manage some of these areas. The Northern
Land Council is encouraging people to move back to some of these
areas, or at least to return periodically to perform management
activities that the land is missing out on. The NT Bushfires
Council is also active in these areas, both in terms of research
and management initiatives. All of these organisations employ
participatory planning techniques to ensure that Aboriginal people
are equal partners in the process.
It should be noted that in those parts of Arnhem land where
Aboriginal people are living, in some of the coastal areas,
traditional fire regimes are maintained. The incidence of wildfires
in these parts of Arnhem Land is markedly less.
