Nature: Survivors Of The Firestorm

Airs Sunday, April 17, 2011 at 8 p.m. on KPBS TV

Photo of a koala receiving treatment after being burned in the bushfires that tore through the Australian state of Victoria in February 2009

Credit: Courtesy of (c) 2010 Screen Australia, December Films Pty Ltd, Film Victoria and ABC

Above: Photo of a koala receiving treatment after being burned in the bushfires that tore through the Australian state of Victoria in February 2009

Thursday, April 7, 2011

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Swamp wallaby on the edge of a superb lyrebird display mound, Australia.

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Credit: Courtesy of (c) D.Parer & E. Parer-Cook

Above: Swamp wallaby on the edge of a superb lyrebird display mound, Australia.

Male king parrot sitting in a tree, Australia.

Enlarge this image

Credit: Courtesy of (c) D.Parer & E. Parer-Cook

Above: Male king parrot sitting in a tree, Australia.

The bushfires that tore through the Australian state of Victoria in February 2009 incinerated over a million acres of land, including key mountain ash forest ecosystems. Fires are a natural force of nature which spur regeneration, but the immediate aftermath of this giant firestorm was devastation.

Kangaroos and koalas, wombats and wallabies, endangered possums and gliders, lizards, echidnas, birds of all kinds, and even fish that lived among these eucalypts were overcome by the flames. Millions died, but burned and traumatized survivors were tenderly nursed back to health at wildlife hospitals by volunteers and veterinarians alike.

"Survivors Of The Firestorm" follows the phoenix-like story of Victoria’s wildlife, the fall and rise of the great mountain ash forests and all that dwell within them, and the extraordinary capacity of a damaged natural world to bounce back.

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Video

Preview: Nature: Survivors Of The Firestorm

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Above: The bushfires that tore through the Australian state of Victoria in February 2009 incinerated over a million acres of land, including key mountain ash forest ecosystems. "Survivors Of The Firestorm" follows the phoenix-like story of Victoria’s wildlife, the fall and rise of the great mountain ash forests and all that dwell within them, and the extraordinary capacity of a damaged natural world to bounce back.

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