Forests of ash: an environmental history.
Port Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Octavo, paperback, colour photographs, black and white photographs, maps.
WAS $40. This beautifully written book tells the story of Australia's giant eucalypt, the Mountain Ash, which is the world's tallest hardwood. Visited seasonally by indigenous people and later a site of mining and sawmilling for settlers, as well as contested ground for conservationists, the life cycles and fire cycles of the forests span millennia. Tom Griffiths tells the environmental, ecological and social history of a unique Australian forest, and, in doing so, tells the story of the continent as a whole. Includes sections of zoological interest on - ants, Lyrebird, Shortfin eel, Hairstreak butterfly, and Leadbeater's possum.