August meeting in Kadina

Our NYP meeting on Thursday 14th was most interesting despite our invited speaker being unable to attend at the last minute.

Some of us had questions about suitable plants for our gardens and got some good advice. Lots more grevilleas and eremophilas are likely to be planted.

I wonder what will thrive in gaps in a paved walkway.  The spaces will get lots of summer sun, so the plants will need to be very tough. What do you reckon would be good? 

The conversation about conservation and growing local vulnerable endangered species will hopefully produce some more action on our parts. It will be interesting to identify some of the plants on our walk through Rocky Bend on Thursday morning. 

She-oaks and selective hares.

We have planted maybe 100  she-oaks (Allocasuarina verticillata) at the Riding for the Disabled (RDA) centre between Kadina and Wallaroo. They've had a very chequered time trying to grow because the hares seem to think we've planted the trees just for them.  Grrr.








The odd thing is - they gnaw away at some of the seedlings. (This poor specimen is only 0.5m high and has very few green shoots left)   ........









............ yet leave others just a few metres away completely alone.

These trees are 1.5m and show no sign of being nibbled, not even the new shoots.






I s'pose the good thing is - they leave approx. half of the she-oaks alone.  Some of them have grown to over 2m in three years and look splendid. 

We're putting tree guards back around the nibbled trees and will leave the guards on for a few years in the hope they will recover.

The hares, or possibly rabbits, have eaten lots of Dodonaea hexandra (hop bush) but seem to have no appetite for acacias, melaleucas  and eucalypts. Thank heavens, cos there seem to be more rabbits and gigantic hares about than several years ago.

Another odd thing about the hares is that they appear to have been nibbling the trees over winter when there is perfectly good grass all around the place.  Can understand them being desperate in summer when there isn't a blade of grass about, but in winter???? What is it with these hares????

Butterfly delight

Jan White reports a delightful time in her garden.

"A short sunny  break in an otherwise cloudy  morning, brought a very pretty butterfly  to my lavender garden. I discovered it was a yellow admiral, one I had not seen before.

After a quick dash to the house to get my camera, I was fortunate in that the butterfly was still very intent on feeding on the nectar, allowing me to get several shots with the camera set on Super Macro. It was a very pleasurable and wonderful moment.

Photographed with an OLYMPUS STYLUS 100EE camera on July 9^th 2014."

    

Jan's garden has a lovely range of Aussies, but this butterfly chose to feed on the exotic lavender. Shan't hold it against the wonderful visitor. I'm watching my lavender patch more closely in the hope of such a visitation.

 

Flowering in July cont'd Victoria Park Moonta

When I walked in the park in June the only species I saw flowering (beside the weeds!!) was the Piitosporum angustifolia, our group's floral emblem.   
The walk today was delightful with some bushes and trees beginning to flower.

Do you know what this is?  The small white flowers are bell shaped, 5 petals and the leaves are sparse and firm. The small bushes are spread all around the park.

  Thanks experts. This plant is Cryptandra amara. 












Two species of wattles were bursting out. 
This prickly Acacia spinescens may well have been part of the 'impenetrable scrub' that gave Moonta its name.











 Acacia  pycnantha looked so cheerful. The grove of  golden wattle near McCauley Park also looks delightful at the moment and will continue for about a month.

I have yet to find out what this shrub is. It has very small yellow flowers with 4 petals. It could be a pimelea (rice flower) but it grows to over 1 m. Any ideas???

  And this is Pimelea serpyllifolia.   





It's getting very interesting at fairy garden level. My grand-daughter comes here to hunt for orchids and tiny toadstools.

Wurmbea dioca are up and plants are spread over a good area of the park.

And the dwarf greenhood grows in the moss, along with tiny toadstools.  I think the greenhoods are Linguella sp.???  









There are lots of leaves of other orchids, so I'm looking forward to seeing the flowers soon.

Flowering in Moonta in July

I've just taken a short walk around my garden to see what's in flower in mid-winter. It WAS a short walk cos it's cold and miserable outside. There are many plants coping with the wind and rain and flowering beautifully. 

Some plants have been flowering for a few months, eg Acacia iteaphylla (Flinders ranges wattle), Pandora jasminoides, Dodonea viscosa (purple hop bush), Chrysocephalum apiculatum (golden everlasting) and plenty of eremophilas and grevilleas. It's been lovely watching the various correas. The bells hang so gracefully and the honey eaters keep us entertained with their acrobatics while they take the nectar from the plants.

Some new flowers have emerged to brighten the garden. Please correct me if I have the names wrong - I'm still learning.  I think they are called:

Oleria picridifolia

Hardenbergia violacea alba (happy wanderer)

Kennedia nigricans (black coral pea)

Eremophila brevifolia

I'll add more plants and photos asap. The cold and rough weather only lasts a day or two here.
I hope I'll get to a couple of conservation reserves, including Agery and Pine Point, and community projects to check them out as well.

What's flowering in your garden?

Floral Design - our July meeting

Kathlyn intrigued us with her presentation on Floral Design at our July meeting. The Kadina Show is coming up in August and we are trying to encourage people to exhibit in the Aus plants section of the floral arrangement competition.  So Kathlyn presented ways we could make items for the different kinds of entries.  We now have a very high benchmark for our entries.

This is one clever lady!
 

 

May Trail

In May a group of us went to Adelaide for the weekend to check some very captivating projects:

• The new water conservation, wetland scheme and the Auss section in the Botanic Gardens
• The wetland project at Salisbury -stacks of fairy wrens chirruping around
• The mangrove board walk at St Kilda.

I'd add photos but I just can't get them to upload.  grrr


Our next group outings are in September when many flowers will be in bloom. We plan to wander along the Ninnes Bullock Trail -who knows what we'll find -  and the following weekend we'll be heading north to the Wirrabara forest to hopefully see lots of recovery from the last two years of bush fires.