Zoe holds a B.Sc. degree in Environmental Biology and an honours degree on the impacts of the fire suppressant Phos-Chek on seed germination, seedling emergence, and post fire community composition, of native and introduced flora from a WA Eucalypt woodland from Curtin University. Zoe is currently a PhD candidate at Curtin University with a keen interest in Cultural burning – specifically looking at comparing ecological impacts of current prescribed burning regimes with Traditional cultural fire management.
Project summary
Currently, the south-west of Australia is being burnt at a rate of 200,000 hectares a year for hazard reduction burning. This burning is often occurring to safe-guard social property and lives in proximity to urban settlements. Whilst there is emerging evidence on the impacts of this rate of burning for this biodiverse region, it has largely not been quantified. Often burning is conducted in a ‘one-size fits all’ model- not considering the impacts to certain niche ecosystems and sensitive species. Current Western fire regimes sees the individual as external to the ecosystem, rather than understanding the interconnectedness of all living beings. The passion behind this thesis is to compare and evaluate the ecological impacts of current prescribed burning regimes with Traditional cultural fire management. This will involve connection with Traditional knowledge holders of Noongar country to understand how the land was cared for, with or without fire depending on the ecosystem. With the 11
increasingly shifting climate and occurrence of wildfires in the south-west, it is important to assess the ecological effects of current forms of fire management on these sensitive ecosystems.