Around 192 hectares was burnt including 125 hectares of the reserve and 50 hectares of
the council’s native vegetation reserve. Firefighters managed to save all dwellings,
although sheds and fences were lost.

MOST Victorians recognise that we live in a highly flammable landscape and that was really brought out as the Gurdies fire came close to houses adjacent to the reserve.
Fire has been a part of this landscape for millions of years and we know the general narrative that because of that it bounces back, in some cases pretty quickly. In the Gurdies reserve you can see the resprouting from epicormic buds beneath the bark, doing what comes naturally and there's signs of acacia seeds that have been triggered to germinate by the heat or smoke produced by the fire. Superficially you'd say “Oh well, everything's back to normal again."