Friday 1 April 2016

AUSTRALIAN FOREST

Dry sclerophyll forests are characterised by their scenic landscapes and diverse flora and represent south-east Australia’s last remaining areas of wilderness. Sclerophyll forests are a typically Australian vegetation type having plants (typically eucalypts, wattles and banksias) with hard, short and often spiky leaves, which is a condition closely associated with low soil fertility (rather than rainfall/soil moisture).

Low fertility also makes soils undesirable for agriculture and native vegetation has, therefore, remained relatively intact. Plants grow slowly in nutrient-deficient conditions and some species have developed symbiotic relationships with nutrient-fixing bacteria and fungi to enhance nutrient availability. Others have root systems that increase the efficiency of nutrient uptake.


Bushfires play a vital role in regeneration of dry sclerophyll forests. Many species are able to resprout from buds protected beneath soils or within the trunk or branches. Other species have seeds that are protected by a hard seed-coat or woody fruit, which are stimulated to open or germinate by fire. The frequency, intensity, season of occurrence of fire (‘fire regime’) has an enormous effect on the composition and structure of these forests.


This post is part of the Friday Greens meme,

and also part of the Skywatch Friday meme.



4 comments:

  1. How ironic that the low fertility is what makes soils undesirable for agriculture, thus preserving native vegetation almost by default. So it makes sense that our amazing eucalypts, wattles and banksias thrive on low soil fertility.

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  2. How interesting! Thanks for sharing.
    At first view I've seen: they are so silver-green, very difficult from our German woods. But it makes a wonderful lightmood.

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  3. Trees beautifully gathered together like this somehow calm the mind and spirit. A great place to wander for a re-charge.

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  4. Very interesting to observe nature;I learned today, something new about vegetation, about this specific area of Sclerophyll forests and the relation with low soil fertility...
    Many thanks for sharing with us! Greetings in April!

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