Bernie Smillie's thick silver beard could do with a trim, but these days he is more intent on thinning a century-old forest on his land near Taralga, north of Goulburn, for commercial firewood.
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''We're not cutting it heavily. We're only giving it a haircut, really,'' he said, looking into the stands of mountain, narrow- and broad-leaf peppermint, brown barrel and candlebark gum trees.
A truck driver for 30 years, Mr Smillie bought 80 hectares for a rural retreat in 2004, then sold some of the timber, felled previously when the land was subdivided.
''It just got bigger and bigger and bigger until one day my wife said, 'You can't keep doing both. You better make a decision'.''
Calling himself the Firewood Baron, he has been in business since, delivering to homes in Goulburn and Crookwell.
Farm forestry consultant Ian McArthur said more than 1 million hectares of degraded native forests in the southern tablelands would be suitable for selective harvesting, which would improve biodiversity and generate an income for owners.
He said the contentious nature of Mr Smillie's operation had led to three state government audits, all of which found him compliant.
''By opening up the forest you allow sunlight onto the forest floor and allow for development of understorey and grasses, which makes the forest more complex and provides homes for more creatures,'' Mr McArthur said.
Neighbour Mark Selmes rejects these claims, saying they are made under laws that require no ecological surveying.
Such surveys showed the vegetation matched that of a tablelands' basalt forest, an endangered ecological community.
Mr Selmes said the area, known as Mount Rae forest, provided habitat for rare orchids and birds, including powerful and barking owls.
''They depend on the existing trees for forage and shelter, which provide homes for the possums and gliders that are their prey species. They can't sit around for 150 years while waiting for trees to grow back,'' he said.
The district's so-called grandfather of Landcare, Eric Hurn, a potato farmer and prolific tree planter for 50 years, says the Firewood Baron is legally entitled to run his business.
However, Mr Hurn believes endangered species live in the forest and, somehow, the wrong information allowed firewood harvesting. ''Mark [Selmes] seems to think he has the right answer, and it would appear so. It just has to be confirmed.''
Mr Smillie has a letter, dated 2011, from the NSW Department of Environment, Climate Change and Water that cites modelling by the Hawkesbury Nepean Catchment Authority and a study by the ANU's Fenner School of Environment and Society that identifies most of his property as western tablelands' dry forest ecological community, which is not endangered.
He said his property vegetation plan was approved under the Native Vegetation Act and accounted for all environmental issues.
The Environment Protection Authority says in future landowners will have to recognise the tablelands' basalt endangered ecological communities' listing but it was not retrospective. Mr Smillie said he kept a 10-metre buffer zone around rare orchids and left hollow-bearing or other habitat trees alone.
''I love it out here. What I really like in winter is driving around delivering to the people who are really happy to get a good load of wood,'' he said.