Jarrah

Jarrah is the dominant eucalyptus of Western Australia's southwest forests - a tree so fire-adapted that it's nearly unkillable by fire alone. It maintains two independent regeneration systems: epicormic buds beneath the bark that can resprout the entire crown after fire, and a massive lignotuber that can regenerate the entire tree if the trunk is killed. Destroy either system and the other takes over.

The lignotuber can reach enormous size in old jarrah trees - underground woody structures weighing several tons, storing enough carbohydrates to fund complete regeneration. When Aboriginal burning kept fire frequent and low-intensity, jarrah maintained crown continuity through epicormic sprouting. When fire suppression led to infrequent but intense fires, lignotubers provided backup regeneration. The tree adapted to human-modified fire regimes across 40,000+ years.

Jarrah's wood density creates a paradox: it's extremely valuable timber but extremely slow-growing. Trees 400-500 years old are needed for commercial-sized logs. This disconnect between ecological timescales and economic timescales led to severe overharvesting. The tree that can survive any fire couldn't survive human economics.

The business insight is that having backup systems changes risk calculations. Jarrah can take risks - growing in fire-prone environments, developing slowly - because its redundant regeneration systems provide insurance. Organizations with strong fallback positions can pursue aggressive strategies; those without must be more conservative. The backup enables the boldness.