Koala In The Bushfire

• Hope Bailey, Grade 3
• Short Story
• 2020

As the sun rose, the air that had been cold for days, felt hot on Daisy’s face. She yawned and opened her eyes expecting to see a colourful sunrise over the bush but instead, from high in the tree she saw smoke drifting towards her. She looked over her shoulder and saw flames in the tree next to her and her paws started shaking. She tried to wake up her family, but only her sister Hope, smelt eucalyptus leaves burning. They tried yelling together, but the flames were too loud to be heard. They decided one should wake up their mum Shannon, who was asleep in the lowest fork of the tree, and one climb and wake up their brother Patrick, who was up the top of the tree. When they got there, they shook the tree branches Pat and Mum were sleeping on. That worked and Mum and Pat were shocked and screamed - they even started crying because they loved their tree so very dearly and to think of their tree getting burned down was heart breaking.


They decided to climb down the tree and make their way to the road. When they arrived in the rocky ditch by the road, they saw a shiny blue car coming towards them slowly. The car stopped by them and the two people in the car - Ben and Kay – got out. Daisy and her family assumed they were married because they were holding hands. Kay and Ben climbed down the ditch and took off their jumpers. They wrapped Daisy and Hope in them and put them in the boot of their car and got blankets from the back seat to wrap Shannon and Pat in.
“Put them in the boot as well” Ben said to Kay so they did. After Ben and Kay got the koala family to lay down, they went back to Ben and Kay’s farm where they put them in dog cages. Kay was a vet and tested Daisy’s family to make sure they were all healthy. Daisy was the last to be tested and she was actually sick from inhaling the smoke. She was put in a different cage which was sad because she loved her family. She wasn’t sure if she could sleep a night away from them and she was really scared.

Kay went outside to see big, red and roaring flames that looked like they were going the opposite way to them. She felt relieved that her farm was no longer in danger. Later in the day, it stated to get windy and the were coming towards them. The flames were really close so they couldn’t leave. Ben got the hose while Kay rang the fire brigade and animal hospital. A couple minutes later the firemen arrived and the animal hospital people came to take the koalas as the fire got put out. Days later Daisy, Shannon, Hope and Patrick were released back into the bush.