FIRE CAN DESTROY COUNTRYSIDE

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 71, 16 December 1937, Page 15

FIRE CAN DESTROY COUNTRYSIDE

6. i ' " §' 11 " 1 1 Ministerial Appeal To Be Careful DANGER IN SUMMER We app6al to the good sense of New Zealanders, as civilised human beings, to recognise how their own heritage is being imperilled by allowing, through sheer carelessness, fires to destroy the beautiflul bush of the country. No hardship, no strenuous effort is involved in prevention of destruction by fire. A little thougfit. a little care in the handling of inflammable material is all that is necessary. Is that too much to ask of a reasonable and reasoning people! The quoted lines above are contained in a joint appeal to citizens of the Dominion by the Hon. R. Semple, Minister of Public Works and Transport, the Hon. W. E. Parry, Minister of Internal Affairs, the Hon. W. Lee Martin, Minister of Agriculture, in support of the recent appeals made by the Hon. F. Langstone, Minister of Lands and Minister in charge of Scenery Preservation, Commissioner _ of State Forests and acting-Native Minister. "Fear of fire and all the destruction it brings comes after a long run of warm, dry weather in many parts of New Zealand," stated the Ministers. "Not only i's fire feared in native forests and important man-made plantations, but over the countryside generally. Unthinking Carelessness, ' ' Similar spells during the pa'st few years have been blamed for the loss of thousands of acres of beautiful forests and so-called scrub, important from the point of view of conservation. There is no doubt that the great bulk of that loss has not been cbue to deliberate vandalism; it has been due to something even worse in its sum result — unthinking carelessness in the burning of felled bush and the lighting of dry scrub and braeken, in the dropping of 'glowing butts of cigarettes and dottles of pipes, in blunders with picnic fires, in, failure to extinguish live embers, in the dropping of lighted matches, and even in the dropping of bottles or other pieces of glass through which the sun's rays can kindle dry material. "Even at the risk of labouring the obvious, the record of every dry summer makes it necessary to tell New Zealanders again that their country cannot afford these losses of natural capital. It is commonplace to say that 'the land is the source of all wealth. ' In New Zealand we already have shocking examples of land destruction. through the careless denudation by fire and other agents of the natural covering of the land. The clearing of suitable land for oultivation is oue thing — the careless destruction of the natural covering of all land not cultivated is another thing and endangers even the existence of the cultivated land on which our national existence depends. "We appeal to the good sense of New Zealanders, as civilised human beings, to recognise how their own heritage is being imperilled by allowing, through sheer carelessness. fires to destroy th« beautiful bush of the country. No hardship, no strenuous effort is involved in prevention of destruction by fire. A little thought, a little care in the handling of inflammable material is all that is necessary. Is that too much to ask of a reasonable and reasoning people? A Few Don'ts. "Never throw a lighted match away. "Never drop a cigarette butt witfiout ensuring it is extinguished. "Never light a picnic fire under conditions that provide the possibility of spread, "Never leave glowing embers or ftiflammabie material that might easily be set alight. "These are praetically all the precautions necessary for the people in general. To farmers we urge the necessity of burning off only at such times and under such conditions as will not endanger adjoining grass land, busfi, or scrub. "If a drought happens to last as long this summer as it did in 1934, it rnay be necessary to have some voluntary organisation of fire-fighters in cooperation with State or local authorities in various districts. If there is a call for sUch service, we hope and trust that the response will be worthy of the national interest involved. This is a matter far beyond any question of politics. What is at stake is the existence of the country itself as a place fit for human fiabitation."