THE WATCH BEGINS

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nudgelbah: In  that February in 1999 when we set out to find a 'logging coupe' I suppose that we did so with what might be understood as 'subliminal knowledge' – some might even say a set of prejudices.  From nudgelbah's perspective, we  were there to test the idea of LANDliteracy and perhaps, in part, the depth of your understandings of a 'place' you had knowledge of, experiences in, over a lifetime.

As you will recall, we set out to find a logging coupe "at random" by driving along a back road in the direction of 'forestry activity'. The clear felled  coupe that we landed upon at Tipunah that day was probably the first we happened upon rather than a random selection. Nonetheless, it turns out to have been an rather interesting selection, even if quite unextraordinary selection, given that it adjoined a riparian zone that will be, should be, protected from exploitation such as clear felling. nudgelbah (ALF back then - Art & LANDliteracy Forum) had on board a can of red paint to mark the spot plus some 'signage'.

It was, at the time, quite probably a reasonable exemplar of the 'forestry coupes' across Tasmania. Likewise, it seems reasonable in retrospect to imagine the site as an exemplar of TASMANIANforestry and especially so given that it was then largely out of sight – and pretty much out of mind.

Toby, what are your memories of that time and your imaginings of what were witnessing in that landscape in the context of your background knowledge of the place?