Week 2 May 2001: Walked down to our Big Dam one morning to check on an equine visitor that had strayed from an adjoining property. We walked through a grove of natives planted about ten years ago. In this grove there are some mature specimens of Acacia parramattensis. We noticed some young wattles coming up around the large plants. They appear to be suckers growing from the roots of the parent wattles. Acacia parramattensis has bipinnate foliage and pale yellows flowers from late spring to late summer. Extra plants of these small trees are more than welcome at Yallaroo.
More planting in our amphitheatre garden. In this garden there is scope for planting trees and tall shrubs, as they will not block our view in this section of the garden.
We had a trip to the property near Guyra, owned by the local aboriginal community. We have written about this beautiful area previously. The area is mainly granite and bulges at the seams with interesting native plants. We will be conducting a propagation workshop there next month. Heard about an upright, red-flowering form of Grevillea juniperina growing in one area of the property. This may be a new northern form of this widespread species. We will take a trip to the site in the future.
Found out about an Eremophila nursery in Central Queensland. They grow over 50 varieties and will send plants by road transport. Eremophilas are great favourites and we will probably buy plants from this nursery.
Visited a local nursery that is closing. Bought lots of tube stock including some interesting species including Grevillea oldei and Hakea bakeriana. We already have some plants of the former and have been anxious to include the former in our Grevillea collection. Autumn and winter will be busy planting periods. We also bought some Banksia robur for our son. We will pot them on and he will plant them as advanced specimens probably in spring.
Lots of spider webs on the grass and shrubs around the house. In autumn, dew condenses on the webs and in the early morning they glisten in the sunlight.
One of our “edible exotics” is bearing fruit. Our Meyer Lemon is carrying about a dozen developing fruits. The new growth has a yellowish tinge that may indicate a nitrogen deficiency. This week the plant was treated with a dressing of urea.