Preliminary muse - fires & the urban cocoon

Following up on Bushfires, rules and real harm minimisation, a comment from Neil Whitfield linked to an earlier post of mine on bushfires that I had forgotten, reminded me that that I had written previous posts linked to bush fires. I did a quick scan. The list that follows is not complete, but it will give a taste. Further comments follow the list. 

• 22 January 2007 Australia and its People - a funny upside down land
• 27 October 2007 Saturday Morning Musings - blogs and fires
• 27 October 2007 California wild fires - a systemic failure?
• 28 October 2007 Bushfires and the Australian Volunteer System
• 8 February 2009, Victoria's fires - at least 14 dead
• 11 February 2009, Fires - stay and defend or leave early
• 14 February 2009, Saturday morning musings - issues raised by the Victorian fires.
• 15 February 2009 A Thursday meander - economics, fires, environmental policy and a bit on books
• 17 February 2009 Indonesian experts arrive to help identify Victorian bush fire victims
• 29 May 2009, Lessons in public administration from the Victorian fires
• 28 May 2010 Victoria's fires - leadership, authority and responsibility
• 30 September 2012 Train Reading - Gammage, the Aborigines & the environment
• 5 January 2013 Saturday Morning Musings - fires, land management & risk
• 7 January 2013 Hysteria over fire risk
• 9 January 2013 A view from the ground in a "catastrophic" fire risk area

I do not pretend that the posts are especially profound, although they do provide something of an introduction to bushfires in an Australian context. The photo comes from the Sydney Morning Herald.

Looking back over the posts and the situations and responses that created them, I have no idea whether climate change has accentuated the Australian bushfire problem. I actually don't think that's important in considering the fires themselves.

Australia is a fire prone country. Our vegetation has been modified over thousands of years so that it actually needs fire to regenerate, but not just any fire; it needs fires of varying degrees of intensity, not the very hot fires that mark the current period. To the degree that climate change is occurring, it does not affect the basic equation. We still have to deal with a fire prone bush.

That is the issue that is exercising my brain. Australians live in a very urbanised society that wishes to preserve its cocoon. I sometimes wonder if the cocoon means that modern Australians are increasingly alienated from the realities of the Australian bush. They perch on the country, but are not part of it. What do you think?  

Postscript

In a comment, Nathan drew my attention to this post of fires past - Trove Tuesday - October Bushfires.

Postscript 2

Neil has now brought up a companion post, STILL ON BUSHFIRES.