Journal exercise (assigment1) Fire in 1788: the closest ally Bill Gammage

Gammage (2011) discusses how fire affected the Aborigines’ everyday life, and how it made the land more astonishing. Australia is a country which is filled with plants and trees , once it was on fire its more likely it would spread, Aborigines had to figure out a way that they could control fires, it was like a “life study” for them, However he also stressed about the way they controlled fire , people controlled the fire by making “Man made fires” to burn land by sections which made it easier for them to control it before the hot days arrive. It was rare they had uncontrolled, accidental fire. Fire lit before rainfall was common, the senior people where In charge of every fire lit on the land in their care as they had more knowledge about fires, as Gammage pointed out that Aborigines made the fire a companion not an opponent, they would also burn the land to suit the animals and plants that inhabited the lands. The more the trees and grass grew the more they burnt as Gammage said “the faster the growing plants the more frequent the fire”.

Grammage points out how little information that people know about fires and lack the skills in controlling them, throughout the last decade there have been many fires around Australia which were “killer fires” and uncontrolled, one of these fires is referred to as black