Colonialism & Woolsheds

Janne Arnesen

Sheep threw the Australian ecosystem off balance. As sheep are not a native species in Australia, there were severe consequences on local ecosystems!

Narrator

This is Janne Arnesen, art historian at the National Museum.

Janne Arnesen

The introduction of sheep in Australia contributed significantly to the catastrophic consequences of British colonialism. For example, no native dung beetle species were able to process sheep’s dung, leading to impoverishment of the soil’s flora and the increase in flies and worms.

Narrator

In order to cater to these herds of sheep, humans were involved in activities such as land-grabbing and ranching, where the land was cleared to create vast ranches for sheep and other animals. Often, the wood that had been cut was used to build these endless ranches.

Janne Arnesen

Massive amounts of trees were cut through ring-barking, also known as girdling, which is the complete removal of the bark from around the entire circumference of either a branch or trunk of a woody plant. This results in the death of the area above the ring over time…and this ring-barking had devastating effects on local populations, as well as the local ecosystem!

Sheep’s hooves also contributed greatly to the soil degradation that changed the landscape. The hardness of the hoof deteriorated the soft Australian soil…

Narrator

Shearers also needed somewhere to cut, and store, the sheep’s fleece, so woolsheds became part of the wool infrastructure that was established in Australia. Many of them would, and still do, cater to hundreds of thousands of sheep being shorn annually.

Janne Arnesen

Woolsheds are traditionally build with corrugated iron, which proved to be the favoured material, economically and logistically, for the expansion of the empire.

The growth of sheep farming influenced technology, but also led to wool becoming a commodity, subject to market fluctuations and price speculations, and became entangled with local and global dynamics.