CONSERVATION
OF THE
FIRES
FUTURE Australia has always had fires. But in this extract from a new book, Adventures in Climate Science, Philip Zylstra argues that everything has changed.
Words PHILIP ZYLSTRA
Dr Philip Zylstra is a fire scientist and forest ecologist who looks at how plant species interact with weather and the terrain to affect fire behaviour, and how this in turn affects the survival of flora and fauna. His work has led to groundbreaking advances in firebehaviour modelling and landscape analysis. Phil believes that the questions we most need answered are often the ones that challenge paradigms and policies, but that the scale of our impact on the Earth means we no longer have the luxury of avoiding controversy. His current focus is on understanding how fire management can be adapted to work with the ‘ecological controls’ that have enabled forests to persist over evolutionary timescales.
52
WILD
