MELBOURNE - Six hundred mountain cattlemen and women mustered on horseback outside Victoria's Parliament yesterday to protest against a ban on alpine grazing they say will end their traditional livelihood.
Generations of high country families rode past as the words of Banjo Patterson's The Man from Snowy River rang outthrough Melbourne streets.
Actor Tom Burlinson, who starred in the 1982 film adaptation of the poem, and Trevor Davis from Tom Groggin Station, the biggest cattle run in the Victorian high country, rode out front.
Burlinson recounted how he had learned first hand "the ways of the mountain cattlemen" and their "truly unique living heritage".
"They've been practising good land management for 170 years and their connection with their land through their family histories, their hardship and their devotion is undeniable," he told protesters.
"This rich heritage should be preserved and protected not legislated out of existence for no good reason."
Speakers at the rally registered a range of regional gripes with the state government and rejected its claims that cattle grazing damages the fragile ecosystem in the alpine national park. Licences to graze 8000 cattle will not be renewed as they expire this year and next, although grazing will continue in state forest outside the park.
Environment Minister John Thwaites said yesterday that scientific evidence showed cattle caused considerable environmental damage to the national park.
