Stourbridge wildfires - expert reveals how blackened grass regrows

Many areas of vegetation left blackened and charred by the effects of the wildfire have seen a return to bright green pastures in little over a few weeks.

While the land in Stourbridge initially appeared "devastated," the fresh growth reveals the underlying resilience of grassland ecosystems, according to a wildfire expert.

A wildfire expert explained why the regrowth can appear so rapid.

Dr Thomas Smith a Professor of Environmental Geography at London School of Economics said: "The rapid regrowth of grass after a wildfire can look surprising because the ground appears completely blackened."

"But in many grass fires most of the combustion takes place above the soil surface."

"The leaves and stems are burned away, while the roots and growing points of many grasses remain protected at or just below ground level" added Dr Smith.

A blackened colour appears to have been replaced by green pastures once again. (Image: James Burns)

Grasses are especially resilient to fire because many species can resprout from underground rhizomes, roots or protected growing points.

Once rain returns and soil moisture improves, they quickly produce new green shoots.

The expert said: "A fast-moving grass fire, like the fires in Stourbridge, may look devastating above ground while transferring relatively little heat into the soil, leaving roots, seeds and soil organisms largely intact."

Ash can temporarily make some mineral nutrients more readily available, although other nutrients can be lost during combustion, so this shouldn't necessarily be interpreted as the fire "fertilising" the landscape.

The expert said: "So the striking green regrowth around Stourbridge demonstrates how remarkably resilient grassland vegetation can be to surface fire, even where the landscape looked completely devastated immediately afterwards."

He cautioned that while the visual recovery may seem dramatic, it does not mean the ecosystem has fully returned to its previous state.

However, the expert reveals what at the first may seem like a total recovery, might not be full story. (Image: James Burns)

The expert said: "What we see initially is often rapid visual recovery; rebuilding the amount and structure of vegetation that existed before the fire takes considerably longer."