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Fig. 8.4 Eucalyptus- dominated woodland with charred trunks from previous fires on the eastern
margin of the MTC in western Victoria. (Photo by Jon Keeley.)
(Burrows & Friend 1998 ; Gill & Catling 2002 ; Burrows & Wardell-Johnson 2003 ;
Yates et al. 2003a ) and (3) is juxtaposed with contrasting communities, such as
rainforest relics (Bowman 2000 ), dry grassy woodlands, chenopod shrublands and
hummock grass/shrublands (Beadle 1981 ; Groves 1994 ) on landscapes where
differential expression of fire plays a key role in determining landscape patterns.
As discussed later, MTV is also important because it forms the economic and
social backdrop to the most densely populated regions of the continent, with
attendant agricultural and natural-resource-based industries (e.g. forestry).
Eucalypts (collectively used to describe Eucalyptus , Corymbia and Angophora
spp. within the Myrtaceae; Hill and Johnson 1995 ) are a key component of
Australian MTV. Eucalypts form the dominant stratum in open woodlands and
forests and they are inevitably associated with fire ( Fig. 8.4 ). They also dominate
certain shrublands and woodlands in multistemmed mallee ( Fig. 8.3 ) and are a
variable component of other shrub-dominated plant communities such as heaths,
scrub-heaths and thickets ( Fig. 8.2b ). Even low-growing heathlands such as the
southwestern kwongan (Pate & Beard 1984 ) contain varying proportions of
eucalypts in shrub or arborescent forms (Hopkins et al. 1983 ; Beard 1984 ).
Communities not dominated by eucalypts are often azonal enclaves such as rock
outcrops, and wet heathlands within a matrix of vegetation containing a promin-
ent component of eucalypts.
MTV refers to woody evergreen sclerophyll plants that dominate systems, but
such taxa often occur in radically different ecosystems. For example, MTV often
forms an overstory in semi-arid and arid biomes composed of hummock grass-
lands and extensive chenopod shrublands (Beadle 1981 ; Groves 1994 ). Although
evergreen woody sclerophyll species are prominent, these represent very different
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