Has it always burned so hot? Fuel and fire in southeast Australian forests

土著文化焚烧被认为是减轻澳大利亚东南部森林气候引发的灾难性丛林大火的一种方式。有人认为，恢复原住民风格的火灾制度将使景观燃料负荷保持在较低水平，从而减少丛林火灾的频率和强度，并减轻对大型灾难性丛林火灾的影响。虽然这一断言基于土著社区巨大的传统火灾知识宝库，但需要在这些高度易燃的森林中进行实证检验。该项目旨在经验性地测试澳大利亚东南部森林的燃料负荷、燃料类型、火灾频率和火灾强度在过去500年里是如何变化的，跨越了英国本土管理的时期。

Indigenous cultural burning has been raised as a way of mitigating against climate-driven catastrophic bushfires in southeast Australian forests. It is argued that returning an Indigenous style fire regime will keep landscape fuel loads low, thus reducing the frequency and intensity of bushfires and mitigating against large catastrophic bushfires. While based on enormous reservoirs of traditional fire knowledge in Indigenous communities, this assertion needs empirical testing within these highly flammable forests. This project aims to empirically test how fuel loads, fuel type, fire frequency and fire intensity have changed over the past 500 years in southeast Australian forests, spanning the period of indigenous to British management.