Local Aboriginal people on the south coast say the early flowering of their spiritual “fire tree” is the sign bushfire season in southern Western Australia has come early, putting fire authorities on edge.
For thousands of years, the moodja tree’s striking yellow and orange flowers have been a warning sign for Menang-Noongar people that fire and flames are coming.
Colloquially known as the West Australian Christmas tree, it flowers during the Noongar season of birak, coinciding with Christmas, but Menang man Larry Blight said Noongar people know it as the “fire tree”.
Its early flowering across much of the Great Southern means fire season is here.
Mr Blight studies the tree and said Aboriginal people determined their movements when flowers began to appear, since it indicated when the weather would heat up.
“If our [Menang] people start to see the fire tree flowering early they will begin to move towards the coast,” he said.
The tree, scientifically known as Nuytsia floribunda, is found across southern WA.
Mr Blight said the trees had already started to flower, a sign bushfire season would be much longer than the past few years.
“I’ve noticed the flower is really starting just east of Albany towards Manypeaks,” he said.
“Normally we’d be in the kambarang season for this time of year.
“But everything is already rapidly drying out. It’s unusual.”
The earlier arrival of bushfire season was starkly highlighted with the loss of 18 homes in a bushfires in northern parts of Perth last week.
