| Brown Mountain | |
|---|---|
 Old growth forest on Brown Mountain | |
| Highest point | |
| Elevation | 985 m (3,232 ft) |
| Coordinates | 37°16′S148°44′E / 37.26°S 148.74°E |
| Geography | |
| Location | Victoria, Australia |
| Parent range | Great Dividing Range |
| Climbing | |
| First ascent | Unknown |
| Easiest route | Legges Road |
The Brown Mountain forest is located in East Gippsland, Victoria (Australia), and is notable for containing large tracts of old growth forest, including over fifty shining gum trees estimated to be over 300 years old.
The eucalypt forest provides key habitat for rare and threatened species such as the powerful owl, the spotted quoll, mainland Australia's largest marsupial carnivore, and the long-footed potoroo. Other animals that inhabit the area include: yellow-bellied glider, southern boobook, mountain brushtail possum, sambar deer (introduced), greater glider and sugar glider. [1]
Trees in Brown Mountain are at least 500 years old, according to a radiocarbon dating carried out by University of Waikato. The test was done on a tree felled in 2009, and is possibly the first test of its kind on an Australian tree. The test results said there was an 84% chance the tree was between 500 and 600 years old. Previously no definitive ages could be placed on the old growth trees of the area. The results may have impacts on the management of the area. [2]
Some parts of Brown Mountain are already protected within the Errinundra National Park, other sections of forest designated as old growth by the Department of Sustainability and Environment between Legges Road and the Errinundra Road are under the control of VicForests, with logging being allowed.
The logging of the forest has been contentious due to the impact on rare and threatened species, the impact on water supplies, the associated carbon emissions. [3] Environmentalists have called for the unprotected Brown Mountain forest area to be incorporated into the National Park reserve system planned to link the Errinundra National Park with the Snowy River National Park.
In 2008, logging recommenced in the Brown Mountain forest, despite Labor Party policy statements during the 2006 Victorian election campaign that they would protect Victoria's last remaining stands of old growth forest available for logging. [4]
Environment Minister Gavin Jennings confirmed that logging the Brown Mountain forest was contentious in his answer to questions in parliament from Greens MP Sue Pennicuik about the logging in progress.
East Gippsland's Eucalyptus nitens forest biomass contains at least 700 (and possibly up to 2000) tonnes carbon per hectare ("green carbon") above ground. [6] Recovery of the carbon debt from clearing intact natural eucalypt forests through afforestation or reforestation takes more than 100 years. [7] Research into the age class structure of Brown Mountain's trees and the forest's carbon capacity is ongoing. 85% of the wood harvested in Victoria's forests is converted to woodchip (mostly for use in paper), sawdust and waste.
A temporary injunction on logging was ordered on September 14, 2009, by Justice Jack Forrest, after the environmental group Environment East Gippsland sued state-owned timber agency VicForests in the Supreme Court, arguing it would be failing its duty to protect native animals if it logged the two remaining coups as planned. [8]
Eucalyptus is a genus of more than 700 species of flowering plants in the family Myrtaceae. Most species of Eucalyptus are trees, often mallees and a few are shrubs. Along with several other genera in the tribe Eucalypteae, including Corymbia and Angophora, they are commonly known as eucalypts. Plants in the genus Eucalyptus have bark that is either smooth, fibrous, hard or stringy, the leaves have oil glands, and the sepals and petals are fused to form a "cap" or operculum over the stamens. The fruit is a woody capsule commonly referred to as a "gumnut".
Mummel Gulf is a national park located in New South Wales, Australia, approximately 487 kilometres (303 mi) by road north of Sydney. It is situated approximately 50 kilometres (31 mi) southeast of Walcha on the unsealed Enfield Forest Road and 12 kilometres (7.5 mi) south of the Oxley Highway.
The Errinundra National Park is a national park located in the Gippsland region of Victoria, Australia. The 26,875-hectare (66,410-acre) national park is situated 373 kilometres (232 mi) east of Melbourne via the Princes Highway and is centred on the Errinundra Plateau, a southwards extension of the Monaro Tablelands of New South Wales.
The Tarra-Bulga National Park is a small national park located in the South Gippsland region of eastern Victoria, Australia approximately 240 kilometres (150 mi) south east of Melbourne. The park is located 33 kilometres (21 mi) south of Traralgon on the Traralgon-Balook Road and 24 kilometres (15 mi) north of Yarram.
Yarra Ranges National Park is located in the Central Highlands of Australia's southeastern state Victoria, 107 km northeast of Melbourne. Established in 1995 and managed by the statutory authority Parks Victoria, the park features a carbon-rich, temperate rainforest and a subalpine eucalypt forest on its northern plateau. It is home to large stands of mountain ash, the tallest tree species in Australia and among the tallest in the world. A wide diversity of fauna make their home across the park's 76,003 hectares, including kangaroos, wallabies, wombats, platypuses and 120 species of native birds. Among the conservation challenges facing Yarra Ranges National Park are climate change and invasive species of weeds.
Eucalyptus regnans, known variously as mountain ash, swamp gum, or stringy gum, is a species of medium-sized to very tall forest tree that is native to the Australia states of Tasmania and Victoria. It is a straight-trunked tree with smooth grey bark, but with a stocking of rough brown bark at the base, glossy green, lance-shaped to curved adult leaves, flower buds in groups of between nine and fifteen, white flowers, and cup-shaped or conical fruit. It is the tallest of all flowering plants; the tallest measured living specimen, named Centurion, stands 100 metres tall in Tasmania.
Leadbeater's possum is a critically endangered possum largely restricted to small pockets of alpine ash, mountain ash, and snow gum forests in the Central Highlands of Victoria, Australia, north-east of Melbourne. It is primitive, relict, and non-gliding, and, as the only species in the petaurid genus Gymnobelideus, represents an ancestral form. Formerly, Leadbeater's possums were moderately common within the very small areas they inhabited; their requirement for year-round food supplies and tree-holes to take refuge in during the day restricts them to mixed-age wet sclerophyll forest with a dense mid-story of Acacia. The species was named in 1867 after John Leadbeater, the then taxidermist at the Museum Victoria. They also go by the common name of fairy possum. On 2 March 1971, the State of Victoria made the Leadbeater's possum its faunal emblem.
East Gippsland is the eastern region of Gippsland, Victoria, Australia covering 31,740 square kilometres (14%) of Victoria. It has a population of 80,114.
The greater gliders are three species of large gliding marsupials in the genus Petauroides, all of which are found in eastern Australia. Until 2020 they were considered to be one species, Petauroides volans. In 2020 morphological and genetic differences, obtained using diversity arrays technology, showed there were three species subsumed under this one name. The two new species were named Petauroides armillatus and Petauroides minor.
Jarrah Forest, also known as the Southwest Australia woodlands, is an interim Australian bioregion and ecoregion located in the south west of Western Australia. The name of the bioregion refers to the region's dominant plant community, jarrah forest – a tall, open forest in which the dominant overstory tree is jarrah.
Corymbia intermedia, commonly known as pink bloodwood, is a species of medium to tall tree that is endemic to north-eastern Australia. It has rough, tessellated bark on the trunk and branches, flower buds in groups of seven, white flowers and oval to barrel-shaped fruit.
Australia has many forests of importance due to significant features, despite being one of the driest continents. As of 2009, Australia has approximately 147 million hectares of native forest, which represents about 19% of Australia's land area. The majority of Australia's trees are hardwoods, typically eucalypts, rather than softwoods like pine. While softwoods dominate some native forests, their total area is judged insufficient to constitute a major forest type in Australia's National Forest Inventory. The Forests Australia website provides up-to-date information on Australia's forests. Detailed information on Australia's forests is available from Australia's State of the Forests Reports that are published every five years.
Victoria, Australia contains approximately 32,000 hectares of temperate rainforest in various regions, which represents 0.14% of the State's total area. The areas with rainforest include: East Gippsland, Strzelecki Ranges, Wilsons Promontory, Central Highlands, and Otway Ranges. The rainforests vary between cool temperate, warm temperate, and mixed cool temperate.
The Warby-Ovens National Park is a national park located on the lands of the Bangerang clan of the Yorta Yorta Nation in the Hume region of Victoria, Australia near Killawara. The 14,655-hectare (36,210-acre) national park is situated approximately 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) west of Wangaratta and 240 kilometres (150 mi) northeast of Melbourne.
The Gap Scenic Reserve is situated in the state of Victoria in south eastern Australia. It is a small reserve in isolated forest country beside the Bonang Highway. The reserve features tall eucalyptus trees and ferny gullies. Significant tree species include mountain grey gum, messmate and the shining gum. Threatened fauna includes powerful owls, tiger quolls and long-footed potoroos.
Eucalyptus denticulata, commonly known as the Errinundra shining gum or shining gum, is a species of tree endemic to south-eastern Australia. It has mostly smooth, white bark, lance-shaped to curved adult leaves with toothed edges, flower buds in groups of seven, white flowers and cup-shaped, barrel-shaped or cylindrical fruits. It is similar to E. nitens and was previously included in that species.
The Kangaroo River Nature Reserve, part of the Kangaroo Valley Group of Nature Reserves, is a protected nature reserve that is located on the floor of the Kangaroo Valley in the Southern Highlands and South Coast regions of New South Wales in eastern Australia. The reserve is situated approximately 150 kilometres (93 mi) south of Sydney, 50 kilometres (31 mi) southwest of Wollongong and 16 kilometres (9.9 mi) northwest of Nowra. The reserve has a protective covenant placed upon it with purpose to ensure the protection of the natural heritage of this area. National parks in the area include the Morton National Park and the Budderoo National Park. Other nature reserves in the area include the Barren Grounds Nature Reserve, and the Cambewarra Range, Barrengarry and Rodway nature reserves – the latter three part of the Kangaroo Valley Group of Nature Reserves.
The Southeast Australia temperate forests is a temperate broadleaf and mixed forests ecoregion of south-eastern Australia. It includes the temperate lowland forests of southeastern Australia, at the southern end of the Great Dividing Range. Vegetation ranges from wet forests along the coast to dry forests and woodlands inland.
The Tasmanian temperate forests is a temperate broadleaf and mixed forests ecoregion in Australia. The ecoregion occupies the eastern portion of the island of Tasmania, which lies south of the Australian mainland.
The Gippsland Plains Grassy Woodland is an ecological temperate grassland community located in the Gippsland region in southern Victoria, Australia. Stretching from Bairnsdale in the east to the eastern portion of Melbourne in the west, they typify one of Victoria's most threatened and disconnected indigenous ecosystems. The Gippsland Red Gum Grassy Woodland is the most prominent community in the system situated in the centre.
