After the photo of the “single-rider” tree trunk being trucked out of Tasmania’s Florentine Valley forest gained worldwide notoriety, I took a walk in the forest, guided by the Wilderness Society’s Alice Hardinge. The loggers stopped work when we arrived and the boss was furious.
The already logged area was studded with stumps more than 2 metres across which, according to Sustainable Timber Tasmania’s management plan, should have been saved from the chainsaws. These are Eucalyptus regnans, the tallest flowering trees on Earth. They are the next generation reaching up to surpass 100 metres in height and to host centuries of wildlife including the Tasmanian masked owl, wedge-tailed eagles, white goshawks and an array of marsupials.
