East Gippsland Fires.

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Digger
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by Digger »

Thanks Eric it was a totally unexpected outcome, but a good one.

It drizzled here yesterday morning but during the afternoon we had a massive downpour! With no grass to slow things down we were flooding within minutes, waterfalls from the higher level everywhere. There was so much soil in the water that I was unable to keep the drains clear.

It was amazing and before long there was a 50’ river of water running down our valley and into the dam. There was almost no water and now it’s about a 1/3rd full! Bloody magnificent!

The place will be an even bigger disaster than it was but I will fix it and already blacks and greys are giving way to bright green , lovely green bringing life back to poor damaged East Gippsland.

It’s not in itself a drought stopper, but it’s a bloody good start! I hope the high country with its fires received the same downpour.

More rain here today though nothing expected like yesterday.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by erik the viking »

Hey Dig;
It never ceases to amaze me how quickly those iridescent green shoots pop out after some rain.
Obviously in some areas the intensity of the heat from the fires can be too much and it actually kills all life, but that green contrasted against the charcoal black is heartwarming. Hopefully the rains come to you in smaller doses that the stuffed ground can cope with. :thumbsup:
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Digger
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by Digger »

Yeah we planted some 8000 trees here years ago as we were producing gumleaf foliage for the forest industry and I guess that most of them have gone.

Going to look good when
it’s cleaned up though!
Last edited by Digger on 21 Jan 2020, 18:09, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by peatop »

erik the viking wrote:Hey Dig;
It never ceases to amaze me how quickly those iridescent green shoots pop out after some rain.
Obviously in some areas the intensity of the heat from the fires can be too much and it actually kills all life, but that green contrasted against the charcoal black is heartwarming. Hopefully the rains come to you in smaller doses that the stuffed ground can cope with. :thumbsup:
It's amazing how much the Australian bush will take, i was caught in the ash Wednesday fires up near cann river and after the fires we used the back track to head over towards our swimming hole and as we past some trees they were still burning inside and you could feel the heat a few weeks later it was raining and most of the trees were green and covered in suckers, there are also many natives that actually require a very hot fire to seed, one guy told me that the mallee pine was thought to be extinct (not sure about just in his area or totally) but after fires up there they came up all over.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by 4liters »

peatop wrote:
erik the viking wrote:Hey Dig;
It never ceases to amaze me how quickly those iridescent green shoots pop out after some rain.
Obviously in some areas the intensity of the heat from the fires can be too much and it actually kills all life, but that green contrasted against the charcoal black is heartwarming. Hopefully the rains come to you in smaller doses that the stuffed ground can cope with. :thumbsup:
It's amazing how much the Australian bush will take, i was caught in the ash Wednesday fires up near cann river and after the fires we used the back track to head over towards our swimming hole and as we past some trees they were still burning inside and you could feel the heat a few weeks later it was raining and most of the trees were green and covered in suckers, there are also many natives that actually require a very hot fire to seed, one guy told me that the mallee pine was thought to be extinct (not sure about just in his area or totally) but after fires up there they came up all over.
Hopefully it all bounces back although it sounds like some of the rainforest areas might be pretty fucked as they've never adapted to being burnt.

Still, it's good to see the affected communities getting back on their feet and hopefully the rain we've had slows down the remaining fires.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by Digger »

When we thin trees out it lets a lot more undergrowth grow and in combination with how dry it is, fires are much hotter than normal and that kills many natives that would normally survive. They have evolved to survive fire, in fact many need it to release seed, just not as hot as this was.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by 4liters »

Digger wrote:When we thin trees out it lets a lot more undergrowth grow and in combination with how dry it is, fires are much hotter than normal and that kills many natives that would normally survive. They have evolved to survive fire, in fact many need it to release seed, just not as hot as this was.
Yeah I saw some fire behaviour specialist say the same thing in response to the people calling for trees to be thinned in national parks. It sounds like another issue is the frequency, our native plants have evolved to live with fire but if the fires start going through faster than the trees can reach maturity and drop their seeds it stuffs up the whole system.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by Seasherpa »

Thinking of you today Dig, hope the rebuild is going well and you are enjoying a few quiet ones. :cheers:
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by Digger »

Seasherpa wrote:Thinking of you today Dig, hope the rebuild is going well and you are enjoying a few quiet ones. :cheers:

Thanks Eoin,
It's a day of sadness and reflection for me and I had a quiet day all told. I thought about relatives and mates that served and are no longer with us now.

With this virus ATM all support for bushfire affected properties has virtually dried up and even then it’s been mainly the wonderful volunteers that have been on the ground helping. Nothing from governments other than talk so far. It’s coming up for 5 months and the place is still a disaster, though there is talk about the clean up being in a few weeks, and of course we can’t rebuild until the site is cleaned up. However we are the lucky ones as our house remains and we have somewhere to live, luckier than many! However it’s taken months to get the damage assessed and every thing is on hold for 6 weeks for permits to replace burned verandah posts. Same house, same posts, just being replaced with new, as some are badly burned. Just bordering on ridiculous! We can’t move forward until we get these bloody pieces of paper to allow us to return our home to an undamaged state!

Same deal with replacing an existing farm shed, 6 weeks for permits! It’s pretty hard seeing expensive equipment sitting out in the weather because the shire wants to get it’s cut.

Anyway we are OK though it’s obviously not an easy time and the more time that passes I get less able to do the hard work here due to age and health.It will take a couple of years to get to a stage where we are anywhere near back to normal, but we will get there.

Thanks for thinking of us.
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Re: East Gippsland Fires.

Post by peatop »

I also have been wondering how you and others have been fairing, I had planned on traveling up your way and ofc then covid-disruption :shock: the fires are one thing to hit a community hard but then a pandemic to slow the rebuild process, you guys in the fire affected areas of NSW and vic must be strong as by now but hey thats what us assies are made off. I understand the need for permit for new structures and changes that affect structural integrity but a permit to replace existing posts thats just revenue raising :wtf: unless ofc the posts as they stand make the building unsafe! But then ofc you wouldn't be able to live there :?

You would thing that local government would visit each permit request for this type of repair and grant it within days of permit request given the situation rather than draging their heals and frustrating everyone :roll: keep your chin up Digs and call for help and support when needed :thumbsup:
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