The eerie beauty of bushfire country

[erudito]

Today, did the first of the bushfire program days for January. These are organised via the YMCA for kids in areas affected by the Black Saturday bushfires. We previously did some Medieval days with them in the September holidays, and these were such a hit we are now doing a series of Ancient days

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[mimdancer]

Yes, we drove to there last year. Through the Black Spur. Whilst avoiding all the bikie gangs (who enjoy roaring through the windy roads) the trees looked really odd, with leaves like green fuzz. The awful bit was going through a place where the fire was so hot, there was no spark of life left in the trees.

[pearl]

Last I'd heard, from a couple of PhD students studying the effects of the fire, there were places where the fire was so hot but so slow-moving it had sterilised the soil.

Oh, and because I'm a geek -- the fuzzy Eucalypt regrowth is called 'epicormic bud growth,' it works in a similar way to coppicing birch trees. (The little 'branches' are then the epicormic shoot. :)