Memorable Topics – Threads and posts that are just too good to lose > Plant Information and Portraits
Australian Native Plants at the ANBG Canberra
David Nicholson:
Plants as well as flowers would be best I think Paul-gives us a better impression. Thanks for taking the time to do this.
Lesley Cox:
Just go for it Paul.
Paul T:
Thanks for the feedback everyone. Just wanted to get a feel for whether there were any major preferences or not. I shall just run through things as I process them..... I'm going to work through from when I started at the ANBG in the first week of May 2008, through until I finished up at the end of June. It is now confirmed that I will start there again on the 1st of September, through until the end of June 2009, so if you are liking the pics I'm posting you should have plenty to enjoy! ;D
Now, please forgive some of the pictures as my camera doesn't always produce wonderful shots of the whole plants.... it works much better on the smaller shots, which was why I bought it in the first place anyway. It gives you the idea of what the plant looks like though, and that is the important thing. Other than working through in a very approximate time sequence of when I took them (i.e week to week, not particular times within a given day) there is no particular order to the photos. If there are photos that you would like closer shots of, just ask as I may have them, or can create a more closeup shot through editing the much larger original files. The worst I can say is that I can't manage to do it... the best is that I might be able to do exactly as you ask. :D
So..... to the very first shot I'll post here.... not exactly a wonderful picture, as it was taken around 7am one morning in early way as I was walking up to the depot at work. This is the scene that greets me as I walk along the road...
Cool eh? ;D I can think of MUCH worse things to greet you. Sometimes later in the day as I walk through on my way down to the Tasmanian Section that I was responsible for, the misters are on, and if the wind is right they waft gently across the road....
The first shot that greets me in the morning is standing on the right hand side of the road in this picture, looking up to the right. I actually come into work from the carpark that is off in the distance through the fog in the picture, then continue to walk up the road directly behind me when I was taking the fog picture.
As I continue up to walk up toward the depot, the edge of the road has all sorts of rainforest type plantings, as it is the boarder of the Victorian Rainforest section in that area. Here's a picture of some of those plantings along the road....
That's just a little insight into my views as I arrive at work each morning (or later in the day as I am using the same road).
While I'm doing the "scenic shots", I've attached a pic of one of the views from the bottom of the Tasmanian Rainforest Gully (which is predominantly Dicksonia Antarctica) and a view of the waterfall below the "Rockery" area, which I'll get to sometime later in more detail.
More pics coming along shortly.
Paul T:
Here's some pics of a few of the ANBG Banksias. I recall that I posted a pic of a Banksia elsewhere on the forums and it surprised some people. The ANBG has a lot of different species and varieties of the genus, and I could take up a few pages posting pics of them I would imagine. I'll post a few here that were in flower at the beginning of May, just to show a couple of different types and shapes.
The Banksia ericifolia x B. spinulosa (Family Proteaceae) was about 2.5m in height, and about 3 metres wide. The plant is quite imposing, with LOTS of flowers. Banksia flowers are rich in nectar so the birds just love them. Each inflorescence (for those who aren't familiar with this word, it is the "flower head") would be about 9 to 10 inches in length, composed of hundreds of individual flowers. This particular plant and it's neighbours were "owned" by a bunch of Red Wattle Birds which chased off any competitors (which included Little Wattle Bird, Eastern Spinebills and New Holland Honeyeaters amongst others) which came anywhere near the plants. They then spent the day just doing the rounds of flowers, eating their fill and wasting energy chasing everything else away that might try to steal any of their food.
The Banksia integrifolia ssp integrifolia is on the steps leading up to the Rockery area, just to the right of the picture I took of the waterfall, above. The plant is about 4 metres wide, by about 1.2m in height. Each inflorescence is about 7 or 8 inches high. The silvery leaves really set off the flowers, and it is a good hiding place for birds as it is quite dense.
Banksia marginata 'Cape Patterson Dwarf' is smaller again, with this plant being only 1.5m at it's widest, and maybe 2 feet in height. The inflorescence in the picture is about 5 inches long.
These are just 3 examples of Banksia that were in flower at the time, and are by no means the extremes of sizes of either flowers or plants.
Paul T:
There are a miriad of Grevillea (Family Proteaceae) out at any time, far too many to photograph and post them all. They're also a favourite of birds, as they're rich in nectar. I'll post bits and pieces from time to time as I photograph them, and I will also repeat them at times, just to show how long flowering they are. For the moment here are a few that were in flower at the beginning of May....
The Grevillea dielsiana I didn't photograph as a full plant. Each flowerhead was about 4 inches long, on a rather spidery plant about 1.2m tall. It didn't come out well in a picture, as there really isn't much to it, but the flowers were spectacular, even though comparatively small.
Grevillea humifusa is perhaps the smallest groundcover Grevillea that I have seen. The whole plant was about 3 feet wide, and only 6 inches tall. The flowerheads were about 2 inches long, but the plant was very noticeable as you walked past. VERY nice!!
And lastly for tonight, there's Grevillea sericea which is fairly small, but I don't think that it is a fully mature plant as yet. The plant in the picture was about 3 feet tall, and the flowerhead was about 2 inches wide. Very delicately coloured, up close it was really beautiful.
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