‘Devastating’ long-term prognosis for ancient Gondwana ecosystem as bushfires turn trees more than 1000 years used to tinderA global tragedy is unfolding in Tasmania. World heritage forests are burning; 1000-year-used trees and the hoary peat beneath are reduced to char.
Fires have already taken stands of king billy and pencil pine the final remaining fragments of an ecosystem that once spread across the supercontinent of Gondwana. Pockets of Australia’s only winter deciduous tree, the beloved nothofagus – whose direct kin shade the sides of the South American Andes are now just a wind change away from eternity.
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Source: theguardian.com