Australian Plants Society Latrobe Valley Group Inc.

Transcription

1 Australian Plants Society Latrobe Valley Group Inc. No. A C July 2018 Newsletter Issue No Leader: Mike Beamish Phone: (03) Golden Grevillea Photo: J Stephens Next Meeting Subject: WA Northern Sandplains/Kwongan Heathlands Speaker: Mike Beamish Location: Federation Training Horticultural Building, Morwell. Date: 12 th July Time: 7:30 PM In 2016, Mike and Cathy travelled Western Australia for several months, pursuing their interests in nature and in particular, plants. Mike has already given us some instalments of these travels and this is a continuation of their movements through the Kwongan Heathlands north of Perth. Contents: Page 2 Leader s Report Mike Beamish 3 Editor s Notes Col Jackson 3 Rainfall Registration Charts 4 Plants in my garden Mike Beamish 5 Warty-fruited Hakea an unkind name for an outstanding performer Col Jackson 6 APS Latrobe Valley Group Calendar and other APS events 6 Other APS events pg. 1

2 Leader s Report Hello Folks, Welcome to the July newsletter, I have inherited the job this month as Colin is off gallivanting around the Simpson Desert and is likely to be out of range for the next few weeks. Thanks to Ray Hodges for his wellreceived presentation last month, on his experiences with fire-spotting and viewing the Latrobe Valley from the air, despite the difficulties with running a couple of the videos on the laptop all very interesting. I ve taken a break in the garden lately, with the onset of the cold, wet weather, so there has been no progress on the jobs in the backyard. The pruning still awaits, the ivy is still taking over and the vegetable garden has been put to rest for the winter. Apart from the new bed on the Fairmont St nature strip, at least the front garden is up to spec. I ve spent most of my spare time doing administrative work, getting ready for the AGM in August, sorting the membership renewal paperwork and preparing the PowerPoint presentation for the July meeting. Sorry I wasn t able to make it to neither Brian Ingram s memorial nor Mary Jackson s dad s funeral, but at least Cathy was able to attend the first and I sent an and a card to Mary for the second, on behalf of APS LV. As hinted above, it is membership renewal time and the current form is included at the end of the newsletter for you to print and send in if you are unable to attend a meeting and renew in person. Please use this form only, NOT the form that you received from APS Victoria in the latest edition of Growing Australian, as it doesn t contain our local Group information. Not all of you will need to renew your memberships this year, as you have already paid for up to 2 more years in advance. The members that need to renew THIS YEAR are Chambers, Cox, Simpson, Aumann, Ingram, Hodges, Stephens, Hetherington, Cox/McInnes and Wiegold. You are welcome to pay for up to 3 year s membership, if you wish to protect yourself from possible increases in fees during this period. Note that APS Victoria are once again offering Australian Plants magazine through your APS Victoria membership at a much discounted rate, 45% cheaper than subscribing personally due to savings in postage costs. If you wish to take up this offer, please fill in and return the renewal form, even if you are not renewing membership this year. Could all members please have a think about their requirements for Neutrog Bush Tucker (or other) fertiliser? I still have a full 20kg bag of Bush Tucker available for $30 and there is still half a bag of Bush Tucker left if you need a refill of your buckets at $2.25 per 1.5kg bucket. If you would like to order more bags in the next round, probably in August, let me know and I ll set it up. Hope to see you all at the next meeting, get ready for a whirlwind tour of the Western Australian northern sand-plains and kwongan heathlands. Happy Aussie Planting, Mike pg. 2

3 Editor s Notes. Our south coast holiday got no further than Portland, partly because we were travelling very slowly and partly because Mary s father s health deteriorated, causing a return home a bit earlier than planned. Even with the early return, we still had a wonderful time drifting leisurely along the coast, doing lots of day trips from the caravan and enjoying its comforts when we got back at night. We didn t get to see the whales although a few were allegedly in the vicinity of Portland. Never mind, we ll just have to go back again sometime. We did catch up with Rosemary though, who was in the process of moving into her new unit, still with boxes to unpack and stuff to find places for. The photos are not particularly plant related, they are just there for bragging rights. It was a great little camp site at Yumbuk Lake where we came for a quick look one afternoon on the way to Portland and stayed for four nights. Such are the joys of retirement! Back home, when weather permits, I have been tidying up the garden. A lot of stuff needed a general haircut or tidy-up, a few more fatalities had to be removed and all of this stuff mulched. I am not going to get time to do much planting so I m afraid my Autumn planting will have to be carried out later on. When weather prevents garden work, I have been busily preparing and packing the Troop carrier for another camping trip to Central Australia and the Simpson Desert, this time in a swag under the stars rather than with the luxury of the motel on wheels that is our caravan. If I don t freeze to death one desert night, I will see you at the August meeting, Col Jackson Rainfall for 2017 (in mm) JAN FEB MAR APR MAY JUN JLY AUG SEP OCT NOV DEC Total Wayne John Diane Mike Carolyn Brian Rainfall for 2018 (in mm) Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jly Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Total Wayne John 0 Diane Mike Mary Brian Carolyn pg. 3

4 Plants in my Garden 144 By Mike Beamish Species: Family: Derivation: Calytrix: Tetragona: Calytrix tetragona Myrtaceae From the Greek calyx, meaning cup, and thrix or trichos, meaning hair, referring to the hairs which extend from the calyx lobes on plants in this genus. Formerly often spelt Calythrix. From the Greek tetragonus, singular, meaning having four equal angles, thus rectangular, though I m unsure what it is in reference to. Common Name: Common Fringe-myrtle. Distribution: Widespread in southern WA (mainly south of the Great Eastern Highway from the west coast to the SA border), SA (west coast, Eyre Peninsula, Flinders Ranges, Yorke and Fleurieu Peninsulas, Kangaroo Island and the south-east), Victoria (Mallee, Wimmera, Grampians, Goldfields, Ranges and coast), Tasmania (Bass Strait Islands, north and east coasts), NSW (western slopes, ranges and coast) and QLD (south-east, Darling Downs and the Main Range north to Cairns). Description: An erect to spreading shrub to 3m tall, with crowded linear leaves to 10mm long, usually inclined to the stem. Flowers are white or pink stars to 15mm across, in dense clusters in the upper leaf axils. Their calyx lobes extend into a fine awn up to 20mm long, hence the common name of the genus. There is a large degree of variation in characteristics, even within the same area. Opinion: My specimen is in the northern bed and has been there for a long time, perhaps 20 years or more, and is showing its age by taking on a horizontal profile, rather than upright. It receives a bit of early morning sun but is shaded by its larger neighbours for the rest of the day. It is about 3m tall (long!), parts of it have died back and been removed, but the live branches are still growing healthily and flower every year. In the best years, flowering is so prolific as to completely obscure the foliage. My plant is the pink flowering form from the Grampians, which was originally named Calytrix sullivanii, but this name is now reduced to synonymy under C. tetragona. Most of the wild populations nearby have white flowers. We have seen it in the wild in SA, in the Grampians, on Wilson s Promontory and in the ranges above Licola. I have tried propagation by cuttings and seed in the past without success, with the plants striking ok but failing after potting up. I ve had another crack early last Summer, since my old plant may well be senescing and could kark it at any time, and have had 50% success, with 6 from 12 cuttings surviving through to large tubes. One has been donated to the Droog s garden at Toora, I ll plant another in my Mum s garden in Morwell, I ll keep one in reserve for myself, so there are 3 extras looking for a home. Sources: Sharr: WA Plant Names and their Meanings. Elliot and Jones: Encyclopaedia of Australian Plants, Volume 2. Costermans: Native Trees and Shrubs of South-eastern Australia. Online: VicFlora and Atlas of Living Australia. pg. 4

5 Warty-fruited Hakea an unkind name for an outstanding performer! By Col Jackson. For most of the year this plant is the classic quiet achiever. Just doing its thing there on the back batter, not only surviving but kind of flourishing in its own stunted style. It does not demand any special attention, happily growing in some of the most unprofitable soil in the Jeeralang s, if not all of Victoria. It requires no watering and is totally disdainful of any suggestion of supplementary feeding. I m not sure how it deals with the local wildlife but, in a garden where every green thing is known as fodder, the local macropods seem to be scared to approach. It may be those sharp spines but history tells me that many a sharp spine has been processed into wallaby poo. The boffins on the internet tell me that it is an interesting shrub from open, sandy and gravelly habitats in Western Australia, which would help explain its tenacity in hanging on to my bit of ground. I am told that it can be propagated from cuttings, but despite numerous tries, I ve had no success with this method. It has produced fruits (the warty ones mentioned in the title) and it s from these that I have raised a few babies, one of which I have installed in another (similar) part of the garden and another has gone through the raffle plant process. We are also informed that the highlights of this piece of botany are its compact healthy growth and, the bit I am getting to, the spectacular winter flowering. This is the really awesome feature of Hakea verrucosa. This year, mine started flowering in late April and it has continued through May, June and may go right through July. The shrub provides a range of colours with the new flowers starting out in a very pale cream tinged with pale pink parts and then maturing to a deep pink. It helps fill the air with the buzz of bees on any warm day as these insects come to feed on the flowers. It is also attracting European wasps in large quantities, although I am not sure why. The wasps seem to just hover around the foliage then occasionally land on the smaller branches and crawl for a bit before taking to the air again. They do not seem to have any interest in the flowers at all although they don t seem to hang around when it s not in flower. For a plant that provides such consistent winter colour, it s a bit unfair to be known for the warty fruits that are hardly ever seen! Sources: Internet pg. 5

6 2018 Latrobe Valley Group Events Calendar Month Day Date Activity Time July Thu 12 WA Northern Sandplains/Kwongan Heathlands Mike Beamish 7:30 PM Aug Thu 9 AGM and Members Night 7:30 PM Sep Excursions to plant sales and/or gardens TBC SepOct Excursions to Yea Wetlands and Mt Cannibal TBC Oct Thu 11 Italian Foodies Part 2 Brian and Judy Hetherington 7:30 PM Nov Thu 8 Button Wrinklewort Ben Courtice 7.30 PM Dec End of Year function venue/activity to be confirmed Other coming events of interest. 21 & 22 July Cranbourne Friends Royal Botanic Gardens Winter Plant Sale am to 4.00 pm. (Mel 133 K10) 18 & 19 August APS Foothills hosts APS Victoria Quarterly Gathering Plants and Gardens of the Dandenongs and Foothills including the Victorian COMM and AGM. 1 September APS Wilson Park Australian Native Plant Sale, Wilson Botanic Park, 668 Princes Highway, Berwick. From 9.00 am to 3.00 pm. No entry fee. 8 & 9 September APS Yarra Yarra Australian Plants Expo, Eltham Community & Reception Centre, 801 Main Road, Eltham am to 4.00 pm. Check website for plant lists. 22 & 23 September Bendigo Native Plant Group Australian Flower Show, Kangaroo Flat Primary School, Freeman Drive (off Olympic Parade), Kangaroo Flat Bendigo am to 4.30 pm. 6 and 7 of October APS Grampians Group Pomonal Native Flower Show, Pomonal Hall am to 5.00 pm on Saturday, on Sunday. 13 & 14 October South Gippsland Native Plant Sale and Flower Show, South Gippsland Historical Automobile Club Pavilion, Leongatha Recreating Reserve. 10 am to 4 pm both days. 20 & 21 October FJC Rogers Seminar Goodeniaceae, co-ordinated by Wimmera Growers of Australian Plants and APS Grampians. Contact fjcrogersseminar2018@gmail.com or Royce Raleigh, Chairman of FJC Rogers Goodeniaceae Seminar 2018 Committee Phone October APS Mitchell Plant Expo and Sale. Kilmore Memorial Hall, 14 Sydney Street, Kilmore. From 9 am to 3 pm. (date changed 19/2/18) 27 October APS Echuca Moama hold the Native Flower Showcase at the Echuca Masonic Lodge Hall, 426 High Street, Echuca. From 9.00 am to 4.00 pm and entry is $ & 28 October APS Ballarat District Group Spring Plant Show and Sales. From am to 4.30 pm, at the Robert Clark Horticultural Centre, Ballarat Botanic Gardens. A display of flowers and foliage and a large range of plants for sale. Hand painted floral art, books sales and other stall holders. 27 & 28 October Cranbourne Friends Royal Botanic Gardens Spring Plant Sale am to 4.00 pm. (Mel 133 K10) Date saver: The ANPSA 2019 Conference hosted by Western Australia will be held between 30th Sept to 4 October 2019 in Albany, WA. pg. 6

7 Leader: Mike Beamish Deputy-leader: Col Jackson Secretary: Treasurer: Delma Hodges Newsletter Editor: Col Jackson Website: John Stephens Librarian: Marilyn Ingram Publicity Delma Hodges HOMEGROWN NATIVE PLANTS MAYBE SOLD AT EACH MEETING.COPYRIGHT: ARTICLES OR INFORMATION ARE NEEDED FOR EVERY MONTHLY NEWSLETTER. PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE THE SOURCE AND ORIGINAL AUTHOR. SEND YOUR ARTICLES TO THE NEWSLETTER EDITOR; note SUBMISSION DEADLINE IS THE 25 TH OF EACH MONTH. MEMBERSHIP FEES; per ANNUM: TO BE PAID BY 30 TH JUNE FOR BOTH LATROBE VALLEY GROUP Inc. AND AUSTRALIAN PLANTS SOCIETY (SGAP Victoria) Inc. Produced with the assistance of Latrobe City Council. pg. 7

8 AUSTRALIAN PLANTS SOCIETY VICTORIA Inc. Incorporation No.A D NEW/RENEWAL SUBSCRIPTION FORM For new members and for those renewing membership for 2018/2019. Note: This is a combined membership form for both APS Victoria and the APS Latrobe Valley Group. If you complete this form, please disregard any APS Membership Form that may be automatically sent out to you with your APS Victoria newsletter. Your details and the appropriate payment will be forwarded to APS Victoria. I wish to join APS Victoria (for new Members only). I agree to be bound by the Rules and Bylaws of the Associations. Please fill in all details Title/s First name/s Surname/s No. and Street or Road Suburb/Town Postcode Telephone Mobile Signature Please indicate the membership type by ticking below all membership types include one copy of the Growing Australian newsletter each quarter. Single membership. $35 Household membership. $40 Overseas membership. $53 Student membership. $26 SUB TOTAL (APS Vic Inc.) $ Please ADD membership of APS Latrobe Valley Group Inc. No. A C Single. $10 Household. $15 SUBTOTAL $ If you wish to subscribe to Australian Plants magazine via APS Victoria, please ADD Australian Plants magazine. $15 TOTAL $ Please make Cheque/Money Order payable to APS Latrobe Valley Group Inc. or direct credit to BSB , Account , use your surname as reference and advise the Treasurer. Treasurer: Delma Hodges, PO Box 84, Churchill 3842, , rj2dh2@gmail.com pg. 8