How do plants cope with these very dry and hot conditions ?

The last 6mths, surface soil water balances are impossible for shallow plant roots to get moisture Except those like the ones shown here that extarct just a little from the clays below ( in otways region clay subsoils predominate so there is enough moisture there to keep plants ticking away ). These skeleton weed and plantain plants in the park at Colac have obvoiusly the best of all worlds
( like anything that still has leaves on at this time of year .)
--leaf stomata that close water traffic on wilting.
--leaf and stem structure that avoids the leaves cooking under the sun
--ability to direct condensation into/onto plant in mornings
--very deep tap root ( both plants shown ) they even beat kikuyu which is the plant to kill right now if you haven't done it earlier .Gotta be some good come outta the drought . More ideas here