In Flower This Week A weekly news-sheet prepared by a Gardens volunteer  Numbers in brackets [ ] refer to garden bed 'Sections'.

4 December 1998

See the giant iris-like plant opposite the door of the Visitor Centre. Commonly called Wedding Lily, Dietes robinsoniana [Section 212] is endemic to Lord Howe Island and has large leathery sword-shaped leaves and showy white flowers on long stems.  These flowers open from the tip of the stem downwards; each flower is short-lived but stems may bear many flowers.

The glowing red bottlebrush flowers of callistemons are prevalent throughout the Gardens, likewise the varying shades of kangaroo paws which are beginning to flower. Kangaroo paw Anigozanthos `Bush Sunset' [Section210], with maroon flowers, and Anigozanthos `Bush Noon' [Section 210], with orange-shaded flowers, are just two of many attractive named cultivars  ... great names, great plants.

Callistemon `Harkness' [Section 124] is a tall shrub with dark grooved trunks and crowned with weeping branches of red bottlebrush flowers. The Native Elderberry, Cuttsia viburnea [Section 125, 114], fringing the Rainforest is a large, dense shrub with serrated leaves brightened with clusters of perfumed white daisy-like flowers. Edging the lawn Grevillea juniperina [Section 107] is low and spreading, with red spider flowers.  An orange flowering form is growing beside it.

At the base of the stately Eucalyptus mannifera [Section 5] with mottled white trunks Kennedia nigricans [Section 5] vigorously twines along the ground.  Its pea-shaped  flowers are black and yellow. Parahebe perfoliata, now renamed Derwentia perfoliata [Section 110], has arching stems with attractive stem-clasping leaves and sprays of dainty blue flowers.

The Rock Garden has much to see, including  Dampiera sericantha [Section 15R] a suckering, almost prostrate plant massed with blue flowers and Dichopogon fimbriatus [Section 15R], commonly named Nodding Chocolate Lily because of its pleasant, chocolate-perfumed, mauve flowers seen along the upright stems.

This most interesting bed opposite the nursery contains Boronia pinnata [Section 44], a rounded shrub covered with small pink star-like flowers, Tetratheca thymifolia [Section 44], with bright pink downturned flowers, and Brachyscome multifida [Section 44], with soft, dense foliage covered with cheery mauve daisy flowers.  Scaevola aemula [Section 44] has large, mauve fan-shaped flowers with lemon centres and  Hibbertia diffusa [Section 44], a ground-cover, has bright yellow flowers splashed across its surface. Leptospermum rotundifolium [Section 44] is really showy, for the shrub is completely covered with mottled pink flowers, while nearby the Sydney Flannel Flower, Actinotus helianthi [Section 44] has greyish divided leaves and large, white, velvety, daisy-like flowers.

Who could not but enjoy these flowers ...

Barbara Daly.