Its the survival and regrowth that is so encouraging. And it can be deceptive.

When a fire goes through stringybark forests with an intensity high enough to burn all the leaves and small twigs but not high enough to kill the tissues under the bark of the trunk and major branches, the scene may appear one of black and ashy devastation. A month later if there is any moistrue still stored in the soil or it has rained a bit) the epicormic buds under the bark sprout out like green fur all up the trunk and out along the branches. A year later and you have to know your ecology to be able to even tell there had been a fire, let alone get a handle on its characteristics.

The ash forests (sorry for the apparent pun but the common name for Eucalyptus regnans, the dominant species of such forests, is Mountain Ash, unless you're from Tasmania; there hangs a tale) like those of the areas around Kinglake and Marysville take longer to reach a stage where the innocent are unaware of an area having been fired (because the devastation is more visibly obvious straight after the event) but 30 years later you have to know your ecology even better to tell that it's a vegetation community with another century to pass in recovery mode.

Most Melbournians will have travelled up the Black Spur road from Healesville to Narbethong (and Marysville) so they can get to the ski fields or just drive through "pleasant bush". Many don't notice that the trees they are driving through on that road are not randomly spaced but are in serried and regular rows. [Or, at least they were; I haven't been down there this year.] They were planted after the 1939 fires to prevent catchment erosion and were thus an artificial environment. But precious few realised they were not "natural" and the vegetation community was "not the real thing".

But at least it now seems we're all at last in Recovery Phase.

Cheers, Rowan