Australian nature meets science and art. By Paula Peeters
Freshwater National Park smells burnt, but it looks lush green. I can hear the sleepy chortles of lorikeets, somewhere up in the bloodwoods. It’s late afternoon, on a hot January day. Maybe they’ve had too much sun, or too much … Continued
Nothofagus, the southern beech, has always held a certain mystique for me. As a child I was an avid reader, and lived in an imaginary world. I was always searching for the forests of Middle Earth, Narnia and Sherwood. Stands … Continued
I explored my first rainforests when I was 14 years old and the experience probably changed my life. On a cold autumn morning at Binna Burra, I awaited the dawn bird walk, an enormous pair of very unsophisticated binoculars slung … Continued
Drive from Brisbane to the Sunshine Coast, between the Glasshouse Mountains and Bribie Island, and you will pass through vast areas of exotic pine plantations. But it wasn’t always this way. Once there were miles of scribbly gum woodlands with … Continued
The most widespread and abundant forest type in Australia is probably dry sclerophyll forest – the tallest trees are eucalypts and their relatives (Corymbia, Angophora, Lophostemon), and below them are sparse shrubs, heath and/or grasses and herbs. This forest … Continued