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the CYPAL process. Oriners‟ ownership status enables relatively unrestricted management
action by Indigenous land managers across the entire property, generating fewer of the
tensions expressed in the comments above, even if resource and logistical constraints
remain critical issues for property management in the wider area (including in the National
Parks themselves). However as previously stated, the KALNRMO have also actively sought
to push the CYPAL models in the direction of greater Indigenous self-government and
independence, with a key argument being an extended track record of successful
management action dating back to 1990. Other groups and individuals involved in the
CYPAL processes may not be able to rely on such a record of capacity and cohesion in
arguing for independent Indigenous management structures and resources. The above
comments are from individuals, but they point to some of the potential tensions and
compromises involved in the CYPAL process and the decision making and resourcing
models that emerge from it. As a property purchased by Indigenous people on the open
market with community funds, Oriners (and Sefton) will always be locally distinctive. However
the degree to which both are distinctive in terms of resourcing, management structures, and
management priorities will largely depend on future negotiations between the relevant
Indigenous groups associated with each station and DERM. In these negotiations, the
demonstrated local Indigenous management capacity and the willingness of DERM to
devolve responsibility and control to local managers will be crucial. Regardless of the exact
outcome of those negotiations, the fact remains that Oriners now has an additional layer of
significance and cultural and ecological connectivity because of changing land tenure and
management orientation in the properties surrounding it. The full implications of these
changes will only be clear over time.
1.8 Summary
The above sections provide some key framing concepts, historical events, and reference
points for the material which follows:
„Working Knowledge‟ describes both the conditions under which the ecological
knowledge emphasised here was learned, its adaptive and provisional quality, and its
orientation to future NRM work on the station.
„Flooded forest country‟ describes the two distinctive characteristics of the Oriners
area- its seasonal flooding regime and the particular habitat types that characterise it
when compared with both the coastal lowlands of the Kowanyama area and the
higher hills elsewhere on the Cape. The forested and seasonally boggy landscape
resulted in low stocking rates and minimal fencing during the pastoral era, as well as
low residential population and through-traffic levels.
„Forest people‟ can be used as a term to collectively describe those Indigenous
people with traditional and kinship ties to the area, but „the Oriners Mob‟ at
Kowanyama is also commonly employed to describe the overlapping group of people
directly involved in the planning, management, and work associated with the station -
the process of developing „working knowledge‟ about the station is an ongoing one.
Reviewing the recent history of Oriners shows how stable ownership has been over
time, with just the Hughes family and the Kowanyama people possessing it since it
was first separately constituted in the 1940s. Indigenous and non-Indigenous
cattlemen worked it for several decades, and the knowledge gained by Indigenous
cattlemen has been important in the post-pastoral management era.
Literature and archival sources do exist for the area, and the approach taken in this
study is designed to complement rather than duplicate existing resources
The commercial purchase of Oriners gives people significant management autonomy
in a region where tenure is shifting to NRM-oriented and/or Indigenous management,
but under different operating conditions from the Oriners lease. It is therefore part of a
growing assemblage of properties whose combined scale may be better able to
accommodate local Indigenous forms of governance, but Oriners is also distinct from
them in the autonomy if offers local Indigenous managers.
Working Knowledge at Oriners Station, Cape York
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