Native forests chipped to grow hydroponic tomatoes!

This is largely what’s left of a 35 yr old native forest at Tolmie, NE Victoria.

[Following on from the previous post about chipping native forest to grow tomatoes]

VicForests’ claim that only ‘forest residue’, or ‘forest waste’, is sent to the chipper for use as biofuel, is patently false. Chippers are fussy beasts, they consume only straight logs – no bendy, branchy bits for them! And if the log is a little too big for the chipper, it doesn’t head to the sawmill, NO, it’s split on-site so that it will fit in. Take a look at these pics, showing a VicForests Tolmie coupe before and after harvest. 90% of this ‘forest residue’  is supplied to Murphy Fresh for chipping and use in their biofuel boiler (to grow hydroponic tomatoes). And if Murphy Fresh doesn’t want it, then it becomes a mountain of firewood for the people of Mansfield.

Q. Why is VicForests logging this 35 yr old forest, rather than letting the trees mature and develop high quality timber?
A. Apparently these fire-damaged trees will not produce good, future sawlogs. But why clear-fell the whole coupe? We can only assume that VicForests’ priority is to produce woodchips and firewood today and an even-aged stand of trees for future harvesting (pulp? sawlogs?).

If you want to know how to turn a healthy, growing forest into hydroponic tomatoes  – click a pic and read on.

VicForests Tolmie coup (35 yr old) before logging; young, straight trees – hardly a sawlog in sight.

The same VicForests Tolmie coupe after harvest.

Look what’s left on the ground after logging has finished – all will be burnt!

The contractor has finished – all to be burnt.

Most of this ‘forest waste’ is headed to Murphy Fresh. Note the larger logs split to fit into the chipper.

Most of the timber from the Tolmie coupe ends up here at Murphy Fresh. This pile of chips was once the young, healthy, though burnt, forest shown earlier!

‘Forest waste’ in the firewood contractor’s yard.

Only about 10% of the coupe timber makes it to the firewood contractor’s yard. None of these will be sawlogs. Why not?

What doesn’t end up being chipped and burnt to grow hydroponic tomatoes, ends up in these huge piles of firewood.

[All images by Doug Vance]

You could be forgiven for thinking we live in a developing country – what’s happening at Tolmie, looks a little like forest practices in Indonesia. Do DEPI and Minister Peter Walsh, or even Minister Ryan Smith, know that VicForests is trashing valuable public assets simply to grow glasshouse tomatoes? Either way, yes or no, it’s a travesty and will turn once healthy, multi-age, biodiverse forests into tree farms.