Sustainable forestry

As a kid going to school memories take the form of log trucks and saw mills, scrub lands and desolation. What I have said before there was a swamp in front of the house if you would like to call it that. The nights were cold even freezing and the only form of heat was a open fire, lots of stories were told by that fire. I went back to see where I lived as a child and there was nothing left I mean nothing, they told me a fire went threw a few years earlier and burnt down the village and the trees fences and every thing. There wasn't even a brick as the foundations were wood and the fire places were corrugated iron. There was nothing it was like no one ever lived there the village was called Bostobrick, West of Dorrigo. Even the timber mill was burnt to the ground. Getting back to the story. The timber trucks were bigger and the bloke who drove one was my best mate Ray. There was a new mill and the yardman was asked if he knew Ray and he did, He was due in in the next half hour. He asked who I was and I told him and he said Ray wouldn't recognise me after forty years. I said he would and he even wanted to bet he wouldn't. When Ray came in the yardman said to Ray that there was someone here to see him and Ray turned round and said hi Stewart I'll be with you in a sec. The yardman couldn't believe it after forty years and with a beard as well to cover my face and I didn't say anything, I thought it pretty cool. I went with Ray out to where the were getting the logs from and there were stumps in the forest which were cut down when I was a kid. It is sad to see the closing of the mill which used selective logging practices. The mill was a band saw mill and the old one was a circular saw mill. They milled the trees into timber to be used in the building industry. I'm a bit of a greeny( the farmer's in Gundagai recons I'm only half a greeny and I was OK.) but I do see the need for logging but not the destructive way they have raped the bush on the south coast of N.S.W and in Tasmania for wood chip. I will stand up to this type of logging any day. As for plantation timber the Forrest's are bare of wildlife and are eerily quite. There is no undergrowth at all. The tannin's that are produced in the clearing of plantation timber seeps into and destroys water quality for fish and the dependants of streams and rivers (including humans). Talking of rivers there should be no stock allowed near the rivers because when they get into the waters of a river they defecate. You can't drink the water below Tumut but you can at the Blowering dam as for Gundagai its a no no. All the towns and city's below farmlands are drinking putrid water that has to be cleaned up at the cost to the tax payers. Would it not be better practice not to have to clean the water up in the first place saving dollars and the environment. Would this not be a sustainable practice? This is why a lot of people go threw the motions of sustainability and never do anything and look down on people like me. More could be said on this subject but I might be sticking my head out too far. Nuff said. cheers Stewart