Christine Hansen uses the concept of deep time to challenge the idea that never-before-witnessed events are unprecedented. Using the case of a massive firestorm in 2009 in southeast Australia, she calls into question the shallow temporal frames through which deep time environmental phenomena are understood in Australian settler culture and offers an insight into often unnoticed ways in which contemporary society struggles with the colonial legacy.

This paper contends that recent scholarly interest in systems of colonising knowledge, whether called ‘scientific forestry,’ or ‘development,’ has paid inadequate attention to the historical processes shaping such knowledge production in specific colonial locations.

Burning cultivation of peatlands has been practised in peat-rich countries at one time or other throughout Western Europe. In these and other peat-rich countries, the inclusion of the emissions from burning cultivation could substantially alter historical carbon dioxide emission estimates.

Scrubland grazing by the omnivorous goat could reduce the risk of widespread fires. But goat populations have been controlled by bans and restrictions for many centuries. The political, economic and cultural reasons why the animal had such an unsavoury reputation are explored.