To the best of my knowledge and belief hakeas are no different from most if not all natives - they hate lime. Some West Australians apparently like to grow in sandy, neutral, soil above limestone but don't like it around their roots. If I were you I'd remove the ash as quickly as possible and if the hakeas are young try and move them with as little disturbance to the roots as possible. If they then fail, as well they might, I'd suggest you obtain a few more and plant well away from the pines. nothing will grow very successfully below pines.

mmmm interesting, just thinking about bush fires and the resulting ashes.........

You may have noticed as you drive past pine plantations that nothing but nothing grows under them. Their needles and perhaps their roots must contain a serious inhibitor. So your chaces are growing anything at all near them is not good. Why greenies think pine plantations are enviromentally beneficial i fail to understand. Pine trees are not called green cancer for nothing.

Pine plantations have one benefit however. Pine trees are fast growing and take some of the pressure off our old growth forests by the timber industry.

They are of course of no aesthetic or ecological benfit.

The same idiot greenies (probably desk jockeys who have never spent a day out of the CBD or suburbs) also don't want the bush to be burned despite the fact that many of our native plants rely on fires as part of their reproductive cycle. The green movement, of which I consider myself part, would do well to either disown such ill educated members or else re-educate them.

Was browsing through old messages (having been away from this site for some time), and couldn't let yours pass. I have to throw in a challenge to funnelweb's belief that "hakeas are no different from most if not all natives - they hate lime".
If "most if not all natives" hate lime, than what is it that grows on the large areas of Australia that have alkaline soil?
I don't know which hakea you have, Jan, but maybe you could check the place of origin before you reject the idea that acid soil is the problem. Australia's alkaline soils. particularly in the inland, are some of the best hakea-growing country.
Ashes only have a very mild pH-raising effect, so if you decide that acid soil is your problem, go for the real thing - lime in a bag from the supermarket. Just be careful you don't damage the acid-lovers that might be growing near it.
Otherwise, of course, you can just get rid of the odd-plant-out, and put in an acid-lover. Good gardening often means choosing the plants to suit the soil.
Trish

You're absolutely right on this one Trish.

Cheers
Roy