The Bush

FirehorseMia and I went to the bush today.  It was cool and dark, and the air was sweet with honey.  There was a gentle roar of the wind in the treetops.  Bees collecting honeydew hummed amongst the trees.  Bellbirds called to each other in their lovely tones. Fantails and waxeyes chattered.  It was very healing.

It seemed a million miles away from fallen houses and broken streets and shattered lives.

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In New Zealand we call our native forest the bush.  The nature of the bush varies according to latitude and altitude.  Our nearest patch of native bush is up near the mountains and it is beech rainforest.  The main trees are Mountain beech (Nothofagus solandri var. cliffortioides), but there are many smaller trees.  All but one, a fuchsia, are evergreens.  This leaf belongs to the wineberry, Aristotelia serrata.

The bark of the mountain beeches is covered with velvety black fungus, under which live scale insects that suck the sap and excrete honeydew through very fine tubes.  This gives the bush a distinctive sweet honey fragrance.