General Chat

Pleased to hear you're still with us Allan xxx

lol Wend: i have to inflict my weird humour somewhere :-D

Good for you Allan - humour in the face of adversity :-D

Hello Allan glad to read you are alright ,All the best to you & yours Barbra :-) x Goodnight

Hardly adversity Wend :-)

Now, just to the North East of Perth there is a real bush fire raging with people being advised to evacuate their homes, at a place called Bullsbrook. Apparently it was started be a spark from a train.

I've seen at first hand the aftermath of some of the fires in WA: not a pretty sight

Apologies, Barbra. I was typing when you posted so have only just seen your kind words :-)

No problem ,night again or good day :-)

Not adversity then. Good.

No need for apologies, Wend :-)

I'm glad you were safe!!



What I find amazing about Australian fires is the regeneration of the Eucalypts.


We drove through the Grampians NP in Victoria in late September 2006, about 9 months after a major fire in January of that year.


We're both trained botanists............... and neither of us had ever before seen anything like the re-growth! I think it's officially called epicormic bud growth ............ not sure what you call it.

Epicormic buds are buds all along the stems and trunks of the trees that remain dormant until the crown of the tree is killed.


But it was absolutely amazing!



I also know about the devastation ....................... my cousin's daughter and her family lost their house and most of their possessions in a bush fire near Mt Macedon in Victoria in 1983, which killed a lot of people. My second cousin and her family were lucky to escape with their lives.


We, of course, have the same thing here ................. only it's the undergrowth under pine trees, and the tinder-dry pine needles that provide the "fuel"

Sylvia,

There were more devastating bush fires in Victoria in 2009 in which over 170 people perished.

As for the regeneration of the bush, yes, it is amazing. Many of the plants have adapted to the conditions and if you wish to propagate them for domestic gardens, especially from seed, they need to be activated by smoke or heat.

Unfortunately, the same can't be said for the wildlife, which takes a little longer to become re-established