Fire managers in mallee country
On a warm, cloudless October afternoon, a dozen firefighters and park rangers from distant parts of Victoria and New South Wales wander about a thick area of mallee scrubland south of Mildura, waving small, plastic-coated fold-out guides to the flora of the area while uttering what to the uninitiated might sound like the coded mantras of a secret society.
Leading them is Dr Miguel Cruz, a scientist with the CSIRO’s Bushfire Dynamics and Applications group in Canberra and a Bushfire CRC researcher.