Wild Dog Ridge

 

You are in a domestic water catchment Please protect it from pollution and damage to vegetation

North of Apollo Bay and just off the Turton Track tourist drive is Wild Dog Ridge. It was recently the site of yet another logging protest, with a blockade of the track by residents, bushwalkers, 4WD enthusiasts succeeding in deterring the logging company from continuing it's operations there. The Department of Natural Resources and Environment had closed the track to the public in a move that can only add to concerns regarding the newly formed Parks Victoria. Last weekend (23/3/97) I decided to go there and have a look for myself.

The first thing you notice is that this "4WD track" is almost bigger than the tourist road you have just left. A short distance along the road is a rusted blue sign next to a sawn of tree trunk. That's it on the left of the page. Logging apparently doesn't cause damage to vegetation??!! The second thing that hits you is that the forest has been cleared up to 20m from either side of the track, large trees felled and just pushed out of the way. Perhaps they were going to take the logs out sideways??

 As I walked along the track I still could not come up with a good reason why they should clear so much bush from the side of the track, especially when in short sections, they had left it virtually un touched. Near the top of the second hill the forest has regenerated to some extent from previous logging. Many people would say that the forest had returned to its natural state.

But most people unfortunately do not take the time to look closer and can't see the forest for the trees. At a bend in the track a few large stumps of trees with their rectangular holes cut in them are reminders that the size of the trees of the original forest was far greater than what has so far regrown. It may seem obvious, but a tree that may be hundreds of years old does not grow back in 50 or 60 years.

As you walk down into the next saddle, you look up and see a giant dead tree trunk, towering above the forest canopy like a city sky scraper bursting through the Planning Act's height restrictions. It is a reminder that this generation will only ever see remnants of the once great forests that covered these mountains. What will we leave behind?

The next day I went across to Seaview Ridge, which has just been logged, to see just what gets left behind after a logging "operation".