The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) marked National Wattle Day yesterday (1 September) by celebrating Australia’s endangered Gordon’s Wattle bursting back to life after fears the species was nearly wiped out in last Summer’s bushfires.
Project Officer in the NSW Saving our Species (SoS) program, Trent Forge said Gordon’s Wattle appeared on sites at either side of the Grose Valley in some of the most intensely burnt areas of the Blue Mountains and Wollemi National Parks.
“The fires burned through our main conservation site near Bilpin so when we went back in, we didn’t know how many of the adult plants had survived the impact,” Mr Forge said.
“We found that we had lost half of the shrubs at these sites, around 50 per cent of the known population in Wollemi and Blue Mountains National Parks,” he said.
“While the adult plants were gone, we knew that this particular native shrub needs intense heat and fire to crack open its very hard seed pods.”
Mr Forge said the team returned to survey the site in August cautiously hopeful for signs of recovery.
“We walked up to the rock ledge where these plants were hanging on to see hundreds of bright green Gordon’s Wattle seedings emerging from the ashes of a very black landscape,” he said.
“We have since seen a 400 per cent increase in the number of Gordons Wattle plants at this site post-fires,”
NPWS Ranger, Dave Monahan said it was wonderful to see clear evidence that nature’s recovery was underway.
“The fire had successfully stimulated the seed bank creating a perfect ash bed for the little seeds to spring into life,” Mr Monahan said.
