‘How we heal as a nation’: the replanting and return of the forests of Tower Hill

Brett Clarke, Tower Hill guide, takes a moment out on the Lava Tongue walk. Photograph: Ellen Smith/The Guardian

Driving through the parched farmlands in south-west Victoria, it is difficult to imagine that much of this coastal stretch was once a vision of untarnished natural beauty.

To assume this familiar rural landscape – the solitary naked tree protruding from a yellow field lined with wire fences – is its fixed setting is nothing short of deception.