Topic summary
Otway Ranges
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Great Otway National Park.
History
Commercial logging began in the Otway Ranges in the 1880s. As roads and railways improved, logging increased massively, peaking in 1961, almost entirely stripping the Otway Ranges of its old-growth forest and causing land degradation issues, but has since been greatly reduced. The forest standing today highlights the lengthy period needed to regrow the giant trees of the past and to reproduce the ecological complexity close to that of the original wild forests. Historically, several bushfires have burnt through the park's predecessor reserves, shaping its ecology and plant and animal diversity. The last major fire was part of the Ash Wednesday bushfires that swept southeastern Australia in 1983.