What if our final act could help restore nature?
For many people in Byron Shire, caring for the environment is not simply something we do; it is part of how we live. We restore bushland, protect wildlife, plant trees and care for the landscapes we hope to leave to future generations.
We should also have the opportunity to apply those values at the end of our life.
Natural burial offers us that choice.
Natural burial is a form of interment designed to allow the body to return naturally to the earth while minimising environmental impacts. Although practices vary between sites, it typically involves burial in a biodegradable coffin or natural-fibre shroud, avoiding embalming chemicals, limiting non-biodegradable materials and permanent monuments, and recording graves through cemetery records or GPS rather than large headstones.
Protecting habitat
The burial area itself is often managed according to ecological principles where existing native vegetation is protected, degraded land restored, native plant diversity increased, a habitat for birds and insects is provided and invasive species managed. It creates a living landscape that continues to develop over time.
A natural burial area can provide a peaceful environment for remembrance, reflection and connection with nature. For some families, visiting a loved one in a bushland landscape may offer a profoundly different experience from visiting a conventional cemetery.
A conventional burial may involve manufactured coffins, concrete, permanent monuments, embalming chemicals and intensive lawn maintenance. Cremation requires substantial energy and produces greenhouse-gas emissions.
Natural burial offers another option for people who want their end-of-life arrangements to reflect environmental, philosophical, or personal values. For many people, this offers a meaningful connection between how they lived and how they are remembered.
Use an existing cemetery?
Rather than purchasing new land and developing an entirely separate cemetery, a suitably located bushland burial area could make use of existing cemetery infrastructure and administration and avoid some of the costs associated with land acquisition and establishing an entirely new facility.
A natural burial precinct could transform part of an existing cemetery into a more biodiverse landscape, replacing intensive lawn management with native vegetation and ecological restoration.
There is a legitimate concern that people choosing natural burial may not want their final resting place surrounded by rows of headstones, granite monuments and manicured lawns. If natural graves were simply scattered amongst conventional graves, that concern would be justified. But that is not what is being proposed.
A natural burial area could be established as a distinct precinct, preferably in a suitably located section of an existing cemetery, with physical and visual separation created through existing vegetation, native planting and landscape buffers.
I am calling for Byron Shire Council (BSC) to investigate whether a suitable and visually distinct section of an existing cemetery could become a Bushland Burial and Conservation Area. This campaign builds upon the amazing work led by Diane and Michael Hart, who I sadly did not get to meet but hope to realise their vision.
Add your voice
If you support BSC investigating the feasibility of establishing a Bushland Burial and Conservation Area within an existing cemetery, please email [email protected] saying: ‘I support Byron Shire Council undertaking a feasibility study into establishing a Bushland Burial and Conservation Area within an existing cemetery.’
Byron Shire residents deserve another end-of-life option that reflects their values, their lives and connection to this land.
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