The annual celebration of the culture and heritage of mountain cattlemen comes at a time of fierce debate on whether cattle should be returned to graze in Victoria’s Alpine National Park.
Advocates of cattle grazing in the Alpine National Park like to invoke Banjo Patterson’s The Man from Snowy River. Patterson’s poem fosters visions of exceptional and fearless riders in pursuit of a prized racehorse escaped and living with wild brumbies, harkening back to Patterson’s words:
“Wind and rain are blowing up from the valley, lashing at his face, while lightning is flashing through the storm clouds below him. He is in the violent grandeur of the tempest.”
The Victorian Coalition Government is facing its own tempest in the form of poor polling, and is in need of support from the cattlemen to avoid electoral defeat at the November 2014 election.
The Mountain Cattlemen's Association of Victoria are reinvigorated. Arguments on the necessity of grazing cattle in the Alpine National Park to maintain cultural heritage and to reduce fuel loads have been dusted off. But these have all been investigated and debunked.
In 2005 the MCAV criticised the then Victorian Labor Government for halting cattle grazing in the Victorian Alpine National Park and “killing off living history”.
The ban followed an Alpine Grazing Taskforce report, which concluded grazing did not make an effective contribution to fuel reduction and wildfire behaviour in alpine areas, cultural heritage did not depend on grazing, and grazing caused ecological damage that was not compatible with the national and international standards for a national park.
The Taskforce found there were at least 25 rare and threatened plant species and several species of rare or threatened fauna in the areas of the park that were threatened by grazing.
In 2010 the Baillieu Government returned cattle to six research sites in a pseudo-scientific trial on the impact of cattle on bushfires. A pledge to trial the use of cattle in the park played a pivotal role in the 2010 state election. The Mountain Cattlemen’s Association backed Nationals candidate Tim Bull in the seat of East Gippsland, delivering the seat to the Coalition, which formed government by the narrowest of margins.
Lacking in scientific rigour and strongly opposed by the Australian Academy of Science and the World Commission on Protected Areas, the trial was thankfully halted by Labor's federal environment minister Tony Burke in 2011. Yet now the new Coalition federal government wants to hand these powers over to state premiers, who clearly can’t be trusted to act in the national interest when it comes to matters of national environmental significance.
New research published in November 2013 confirms once again that cattle grazing in the Alpine National Park does not reduce bushfires there, as eucalypt forests present the greater fire risk than grassland. This is consistent with the findings of the 2005 taskforce.
The debate on allowing cattle to graze in the Alpine National Park will continue because it has the potential to determine the result of the upcoming Victorian election. Those involved should be up front about the benefits.
The tradition of Patterson’s horsemen is one that must be kept. They are an important part of our history. But modern day mountain cattlemen do not embody Patterson’s vision. We live in a different era. Anyone is of course free to ride and graze cattle in the high country state forests surrounding the Alpine National Park, and to maintain mountain heritage through events like the annual Cattleman’s Cup.
Allowing cattle into Victoria’s fragile Alpine National Park is plain and simple a financial windfall for a few farmers. The graziers who fight for the right to graze their cattle in the Alpine National Park do so because it provides them with essentially free fodder. And that means larger herds and fatter cattle bringing more profit.
The financial impact of the 2005 ban was recognised with generous compensation paid to licence holders of $100 for each head of cattle per year over three years. Another $2 million was set aside for weed and pest animal control in the park, along with $650,000 for rehabilitation of the areas cattle damaged.
The financial benefit to a few farmers from access to alpine grass under the false guise of fuel reduction is not worth the cost to the taxpayer to restore damaged landscapes, or the cost to all of us who want to enjoy the unique and fragile high country.
Many of us are fond of the Victorian high country. Of the landscape, trails, huts and lore. These are best experienced without cattle.
It’s time to stop hiding behind romantic notions of ‘heritage’ cattlemen riding the Victorian high plains, or of fire retardant cattle.
Cattle belong in paddocks, not national parks.
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