Katherine Henderson
Mar 20, 2025
An opportunity to create a fire proof local ecosystem in a changing world
On 14th April 2024 a wildfire began in Tarbena Valley and raged for three days. This event so fundamentally changed the farm that we believe it should have a mention on the website. We managed to evacuate half of our animals but the others were trapped in the fire. The military firefighters who were called in, saved our remaining goats by bringing them food and water every day. Every tree on our land was burned and the ground scorched. Once the fire was brought under control we managed to return but the land was so damaged and toxic for the goats that we had to move to a neighboring valley for six months.
It has been almost a year since the fire and we have moved back home. Through experience, observation and discussions we have learned a huge amount about our land, the reasons for local farming practices, the resilience of local flora and the need to design a safer future in a changing world. We have noticed that throughout the fire zone all of the indigenous trees and flora have sprung back to life and the land around them is bountiful. The non indigenous pine trees are all dead as is the land that they stand in.
80% of the trees on our land were non indigenous pine trees and they are all dead. We have to remove them and are going to replace them with a poly-culture. Echoing our observations of successful local systems we will be planting a mixture of slow and fast growing trees that will create a canopy under which a huge variety of local flora and fauna can live and the earth will be protected from the hot sun.
We see this as a long term project and, of course it will be costly. When we set up the goat farm we did not expect to be doing this but as the saying goes ¨why waste a good crisis¨. We need help with funding and have set up a Go fund me campaign. In return for any donations, donators adopt a tree and are asked to name that tree. This can be a family name, a loved one, yourself or a pet. Each tree will have a name tag.
https://www.gofundme.com/f/rebuild-a-sustainable-ecosystem-damaged-by-a-fire-in-2024