Homepaddock notes that the same thing is happening in NZ. What most Greens don’t understand is that Farmers have to respeck land in both countries because if they do not the fertility erodes.

Which is not profitable.

They aslo forget that humans are part of the ecosystem, that ecosystems change (with the climate — I am still amused about people beleiving that it was warmer when the dinosaurs roamed but recent warming is doe to us)

But, three chaers for Mr Sheehan, and the county should pay him his fine and expenses back in teturn for advising others to do what he did.

The Sheahans’ 2004 court battle with the Mitchell Shire Council for illegally clearing trees to guard against fire, as well as their decision to stay at home and battle the weekend blaze, encapsulate two of the biggest issues arising from the bushfire tragedy.

Do Victoria’s native vegetation management policies need a major overhaul? And should families risk injury or death by staying home to fight the fire rather than fleeing?

Anger at government policies stopping residents from cutting down trees and clearing scrub to protect their properties is already apparent. “We’ve lost two people in my family because you dickheads won’t cut trees down,” Warwick Spooner told Nillumbik Mayor Bo Bendtsen at a meeting on Tuesday night.

Although Liam Sheahan’s 2002 decision to disregard planning laws and bulldoze 250 trees on his hilltop property hurt his family financially and emotionally, he believes it helped save them and their home on the weekend.

“The house is safe because we did all that,” he said as he pointed out his kitchen window to the clear ground where tall gum trees once cast a shadow on his house.

“We have got proof right here. We are the only house standing in a two-kilometre area.”

via Fined for illegal clearing, family now feel vindicated | smh.com.au.