Funny you should mention that but I was thinking the same thing last time I watched it. Perhaps they are waking up to the fact that there IS a call for it.
Cheers,
Dee.

I agree that it *may* be in response to demand, but I also believe that a lot of the content in the various media is, purely and simply, cyclical. 'Waterwise' gardens are a hot issue at the moment, and that puts natives back in the spotlight, but it remains to be seen whether or not large numbers of longtime gardeners suddenly embrace natives over their favourite exotics. Many plants from places like South Africa and Mexico are just as drought-tolerant as our own natives, but I think there is a bigger issue at stake - conservation. I'm as guilty as almost anyone of ignoring the local provenance edict when I buy plants, but I find myself increasingly drawn to the species which are endemic to the Fitzroy region - I can certanly admire WA wildflowers, but they may as well be Indonesian wildflowers when it comes to my own garden. As always, your mileage may differ :)

Cheers,

Artie

It's almost impossible to get local provenance plants, unless you have a nursary literally down the road which sorces seeds and cutting from local bushland. Even then you can't be guaranteed that they are the real thing! Bush regenerators do this for obvious reasons, but I doubt very much nursaries do. Also, to take the seeds and cuttings yourself would be illegal. Surely a choice of a WA native over an exotic species in the garden would be much more beneficial to native birds and animals, and would provide them with a much more "comfortable" habitat.

I don't think that is always the case Pos. For example I have a feijoa tree that the rosellas just adore (the flowers). Even my abelia is of great interest to them in it's seeding stage. My neighbours birch trees seeds are always being munched on by them as well. The little thornbills love my abelia to dart in and out of to the birdbath. The magpies have claimed the pine trees in the park as their own nesting trees and are quite disgruntled when the black cockatoos come in to vandalise pine cones for the seeds. I don't even need to mention possums and roses! I could go on, but I think you get the picture. I think there is room for both.
Cheers,
Dee.

Why is it illegal to take your own cuttings? Getting a licence for crown land collection is no biggy.

See that's interesting Nathan because I didn't know that and neither would a lot of other people I suspect. I don't know the reason why GA are doing more native segments but IMHO there can come (mostly) nothing but good from it.

I'm gradually converting my garden to natives but sometimes I get frustrated because of the lack of information available to the average gardener. Why is this so? Why is there not more widespread knowledge about natives? I'm sure that even a lot of non-gardeners could tell you a lot about roses but I can't find anyone (locally) who can tell me whether there's a medium height melaleuca I can grow in my lousy clay soil that will cope with a strong SW wind and the roots from the neigbour's pittosporums.

Sorry, I probably sound like a mad woman (put it down to the local nurserywoman who not once but TWICE tried to sell me a plant that she confidently assured me was 'the oz native violet' [it wasn't]). The more information that gets to the general public the better IMHO.

regards
Reilly (anyone have any suggestions on the melaleuca BTW?)

reillyoz007
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The lack of info about indigenous/local native plants is why I have set up my web site: http://www.eftel.net.au/~gregsplants

pos02
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You need to keep in mind that some WA native plants, e.g. Sollya heterophylla or Native Bluebell Creeper, are environmental weeds in Victoria. Cootamundra Wattle from NSW is another example of an Australian native environmental weed.
If you stick to local native plants you really can't do any harm to your local environment.

I've overheard enough conversations at nurseries to know there's a need for descriptive labels which provide good and local information. Detest the setup where a label proudly announces *cultivar name*, no acknowledgement of botanical pedgree. Alarm bells should ring for the young couples if the nursery person reads the label out to them when asked for information.

I think we are quite well off for printed info in Rocky; the SGAP branch has published a list of 500 plants from the Fitzroy Basin and their best uses, and recently Livingstone Shire at Yeppoon has put out a booklet listing suitable local plants. Calliope Landcare printed an excellent booklet with colour pix several years; probably difficult to find now. In short, you could find yourself better educated than the typical nursery staff on indigenous spp.

Mackay SGAP has an active propagation group and does a roaring trade once a year selling local tubestock along with a descriptive handout. They also sell at their monthly meetings tho' I doubt many non-members would go. Councils' vegetation/ Bushcare officers *should* be able to direct people to sources of indigenous plants, one would hope.

Reilly,

There is lots of local info about natives including indigenous, although it is not always available at general nurseries.
See is there are any Australian Plant Society (APS) or landcare groups in your area.
Look for landcare hgroups on the DSE website http://www.dse.vic.gov.au/dse/index.htm

and APS groups on the APS - Victoria website

Here is a link that might be useful: Australian Plants Society - Victoria

The December Gardening Australia mag has an _excellent_ little booklet on its front cover about environmental weeds - which includes those natives that can become problems if they escape (such as the Cootamundra wattle), and then recommends replacements for those weeds. Where feasible, they recommend appropriate native replacements.

And inside there's a whole section on natives.

I should note that I only read the native sections for information on the ones you can eat, but hey, it's all good :)

The Organic Gardening magazine put out by Gardening Australia is also getting interested in natives - tending to focus on the bushfoods aspect of things, which is excellent.

Local provenance plants are definitely the way to go, but how can someone in suburbia ensure he/she gets the right plant? If you take the same species from a different area, it is no longer a provenace plant. May not be a big issue for most species however. Regarding native birds and exotic plants, it seems that there are a few species which have learnt to survive in the cities where local bushlad has been depleted. Perhaps they use these exotic plant because there is no option.

If your local chapter of the SGAP cant put you onto a source for local species, then I guess its time to take a drive into whatever remnant bushland you have in your area. If that isnt sufficient, the GA book on Native Plants usually indicates which part of Oz a given plant originates from - at *worst*, I can point to my Syzygium Australe as being endemic to the East Coast, and several of the species in my garden come from CQ, if not specifically from Rocky.

Some local councils have brochures on endemic plants, I know ours does.
Cheers,
Dee.

"Regarding native birds and exotic plants, it seems that there are a few species which have learnt to survive in the cities where local bushlad has been depleted. Perhaps they use these exotic plant because there is no option."

... or because they found a new, exotic taste they'd not had before! Just because something is adapted for a particular ecosystem doesn't mean it can't adapt to a similar one - particularly if it happens to be a more viable version of the one they're already used to.

Hence parrots learning _very_ quickly about the liquid-rich, sugary European fruits - so much nicer and easier than the hard work inherent in Australia's liquid-conservative fuits and flowers. Or wombats learning that potatoes are so much worthier of effort than yam daisy roots - because potatoes are larger, juicier, and have more nutrients for them. And possibly taste better to a wombat :)

And why some exotics take off and take over - but others just snuff it. And why, of course, the same happens when Australian plants are taken overseas - our little plants are major weeds in other locations.

OK, this is where I have to put my greenie hat on and read you all the riot act :)

We completely altered the balance when we started clearing land, shooting animals and grazing livestock, and we did it in a way that no amount of aboriginal burning had done for thousands of years. By introducing artifical food into the system, we completely skewed the balance in favour of certain species, and to the detriment of others. Evolution ? Only if Darwins cycles could be measured in decades ...

Native species will probably never regain the balance they enjoyed prior to the arrival of white civilisation, but surely we can give them a fighting chance. End of sermon :)

Well, that's why my partner and I wish to buy wooded acreage in NSW. 50 acres or so of mostly bush, with a few cleared acres for the self-sufficiency garden and small-scale commercial farming of native produce (what is grown will depend entirely on where we end up, and that hasn't been decided yet), and the rest returned/maintained in as "pristine" a state as conditions will allow. While islands of green only support local ecosystems, if they can be inter-connected with "wildlife corridors", a network of bushland can spring up. Instead of the remnant bushland being surrounded by the barren pastureland, the pastureland gradually becomes surrounded - "moated" - by the bushland belts.

Of course, it's hardly the ideal situation ... but then, a continent like Australia attempting to support 20million people, or a planet like Earth attempting to support 6 billion people, are also hardly ideal situations. We can just keep our eyes focussed on the ideal and do our best to work toward them ...