Always keen to try something new, Conor Doherty recruited a trusty friend and headed off on a sunny autumn morning to Orienteering WA’s second bush event of the 2023 season: Spice Brook.

Careful observers of the Australian bush may have noticed that, following fires, there are often more plant species present in the live vegetation than there were beforehand. Some of these newly appeared species recruit from seeds stored in the soil and can initially be abundant, yet disappear after a few years, only to reappear later after another fire. These species are known as fire ephemerals.

The new, 108-metre span suspension bridge across the Murray River at Dwaarlindjirraap, within Lane Poole Reserve, was a major component of the $8.4 million Dwellingup Adventure Trails project.