Up front
Within a week or two of arriving in Townsville, I started working voluntarily at a nursery operated by a local environmental non-government organisation. It’s something I’d been looking forward to doing since first learning of its operations soon after deciding to move here, and now I work there once a week during its limited opening hours. The nursery is well-staffed, and managed, and I look forward each week to working there each week, knowing that so many of the plants sold there are used for revegetation and ecological restoration work in and around Townsville. Further, the nursery is punching above its weight in promoting native plants for suburban gardens. Just before the Christmas and New Year break, I counted thirteen or so mostly volunteers beavering away at sorting, treating, and sowing seed; pricking out and transplanting seedlings; stock-taking; weeding; raking and cleaning; mixing medium-grade pine-bark and sand for potting soil; rinsing and sterilising returned plant-tubes and seedling trays; and last, but not least, serving customers. It’s a hive of activity.
In and of itself, the work isn’t particularly tiring, but more often than not it is made so — for me at least — by the heat and humidity. This is despite so many of the tasks being able to be completed under solid shade and sometimes while there’s a sea breeze. I’ll have to learn to bear with heat and humidity because there’s simply no avoiding it at this time of year. Most other staff develop as equally sweat-sodden clothing as mine within the first hour of work, but seem oblivious to its discomfort.
Having lived in Borneo, one could be forgiven for thinking that I’d have acclimatised to the heat and humidity by now. It surprises me that my Borneo days were filled almost fifteen years ago — again, working as a volunteer — but that seems to be par for the course when it comes to ageing. So much of one’s experiences seem to have happened ‘just yesterday’, and the future is rapidly disappearing. Heat and humidity notwithstanding, I genuinely enjoy working at the nursery in the company of other like-minded people of various ages, backgrounds, cultural heritage, and ability. There’s also the pleasantness of working within earshot of Pacific Ocean waves breaking over the nearby beach. What’s more, it’s the perfect place for me to build on my knowledge of which native plants ought to grow well in my newly adopted city.
What drew me to the nursery is its commitment to selling indigenous plants. All of the nursery’s propagation material — seeds and cuttings — is sourced from within fifty kilometres of the city. That area easily encompasses places like Alligator Creek, Magnetic Island, Pinnacles National Park, Mount Cataract Forest Reserve, and the southern end of the Paluma Range National Park. It stands to reason that because almost all the plants destined for my garden are indigenous to this region, I’ll source them from the nursery, but as its stock list and available growing space is limited, not all the plants I want are available. Tracking down the other species is likely to take some sleuthing, especially for a few of the smaller plants like orchids and ferns. There are, unfortunately, few nurseries in and around Townsville other than those attached to hardware megastores. Nonetheless, I’ve made a solid start in collecting plants for my garden, the first tranche of which were bought as tube-stock sized plants — larger potted plants are very rarely sold.
1 x Native Dutchman’s pipe (Aristolachia acuminata)
9 x Brown gardenia (Atractocarpus fitzalanii)
2 x Coastal she-oak (Casuarina equisetifolia)
1 x Broad-leafed palm lily (Cordyline manners-suttoniae)
1 x Common waxflower (Hoya australis)
1 x Pink euodia (Melicope elleryana)
1 x Leichhardt pine (Nauclea orientalis)
1 x Butterfly bush (Pavetta australiensis)
1 x Cardwell lily (Proiphys amboinensis)
2 x Peanut tree (Sterculia quadrifida)
1 x Damson plum (Terminalia microcarpa)
Anyone unfamiliar with these plant names won’t know that the Damson plum is not a damson; the Peanut tree is not a peanut; the Leichardt pine is not a pine; the Cardwell lily is not a lily; the palm lily is neither palm nor lily; and the she-oak is — yes you guessed it — not an oak. Nor do many of these common names resemble their namesake’s appearance. The she-oak, for example, was named after the grain of its timber, which, once finished, resembles that of English oak. The tree itself looks nothing like any deciduous oak I’ve ever seen. Common names are too often deceitful — one should always approach them with a great deal of caution. I focus on using Latin binomial names, and though they’re sometimes tricky to pronounce, they’re more reliable when it comes to matching name with plant.
Anyone who is familiar with the names of the above-listed species are, however, likely to know that at least two of the plants they describe attract butterflies. And not just any butterflies, but Australia’s largest, the Cairns birdwing, which lays its eggs on the underside of leaves of the Native Dutchman’s pipe, among a handful of other plant species. And then there’s what must be the country’s most dazzling butterfly, the iridescent light electric-blue and pitch black Ulysses butterfly, which lays its eggs on Pink euodia leaves, among some other species.
Its common name tells me that Pavetta australiensis also attracts butterflies, but given my distrust of common names, it surprises me little to learn that this plant is particularly attractive to moths, especially the Coffee hawk-moth and Gardenia hawk-moth. I understand that the meaning of words like ‘butterfly’ and ‘moth’ are contested, so perhaps my distrust of common names is in this instance a moot point. But nonetheless, the more moths and butterflies I attract to my garden, the merrier. Indeed, I can’t imagine why anyone with a large enough garden, and who lives within the home range of the first two butterflies, would not want to actively seek the presence of these exquisite creatures by planting some of their favoured larval and adult food plants. Who cares if a few leaves are lost to caterpillars?
Most of the tall trees planned for my garden appear in this list and were purposefully bought early because they’ll take the longest time to mature; provide shade for other plants to grow beneath; and also begin to shade some of my house — particularly its north- and west-facing walls. The two Casuarinas offer diffuse shade, and not much at that, so while they were initially destined for the front yard which faces barely a degree from true west, they might instead be added — one each — to the far corners of the back garden. The sound of wind blowing through their sparse mass of slender photosynthetic stems — their leaves are so small as to be vestigial — evokes for me, carefree childhood summer afternoons at my paternal grandparents’ house in Brighton where their neighbour’s Casuarinas (probably Allocasuarina cunninghamii), towered over the immediate neighbourhood, catching afternoon sea breezes with a distinct swishing sound that rose and fell in pitch, volume, and duration according to the strength and persistence of the prevailing wind.
The front garden I’ve designed for my house in Townsville will, in time, appear quite formal, with a limited colour palette of vivid red flowers and green foliage. Hedges of Ixora (not the white-flowered native species, which will be included elsewhere) and Ehretia microphylla — more commonly known as the Fukien tea tree, its Latin name was recently updated from Carmona retusa — will be kept clipped to about chest height, and tucked back about half a metre behind the white picket fence. Ehretia has a broad natural distribution extending from India eastward through South East Asia, Southern China, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, and northern Queensland. Why hedges of it and Ixora will be planted at a slight distance from the wooden fence is so that they can be more easily and neatly maintained, and also to help ensure that the wooden fence is more exposed to circulating air, helping to slow its inevitable decay. I’d prefer to have a different fence — one less clichéd as far as fencing styles go — but I won’t replace it purely for stylistic purposes, as I’ve a stronger preference to wait until something is no longer serviceable before it’s replaced. By then, if I’m still alive, the front fence will be removed in favour of something more agreeable in style.
There’s a central concrete path leading from the front door of my house to a gate at the fence. As with the fence, I’d prefer that this path not exist, but am content for now to leave it be — waste not, want not and all. Besides, it has been thickly laid and will prove more than a handful to be removed. The path divides the front lawn into two oblong-shaped spaces which will be edged with the above-mentioned hedges growing in a perforated fashion but which join at the corners. The space enclosed by the hedges will be filled with an herbaceous perennial known commonly as Scarlet bloodroot (Haemodorum coccineum). It’s related to Western Australia’s kangaroo-paw (Anigozanthus sp.), but it’s sixty-centimetre or so high narrow strap-like foliage dies back to an underground root-mass during the dry, whereupon the whole plant lays dormant until the next wet season wakens it. A layer of coarse reddish-brown sand or fine gravel will be added to the top of the enclosed space so that during the Haemodorum’s dormancy, the ground can be easily raked and maintained weed-free.
At the exact centre of each of the oblong shaped spaces bordered by the hedges, a tree will be planted. The Casuarinas were my first choice, but since I began living in my house I’ve noticed a distinct need for its triple-fronted west-facing walls to receive afternoon shade — the interior of the house warms up in the afternoon to a temperature that is far from being comfortable. I’ve also noticed two red-flowered native tree species growing well in and around Townsville — the Flame tree (Brachychiton acerifolious), and Bat’s-wing coral tree (Erythrina vespertilio). Both are dry-season deciduous. The first begins to smother itself in an almost uniform mass of scarlet-red snowflake-shaped flowers as its leaves begin to drop until none or almost none are left, at which point the tree becomes unavoidably eye-catching. Other than some northern-hemisphere maples that turn solid red during autumn, I can’t think of any other large tree that alternates in colour so vividly between green and red. Describing its flowers as ‘snowflake-shaped’, by the way, does not allude to them being the shape of flakes, but being similar in form to the clear white flowers of the bulbous perennial known as Snowflake (Leucojum æstivum). The Bat’s-wing coral tree has large deep salmon coloured pea-shaped flowers born in large distinct clusters. Hiking up Castle Hill early one Sunday morning late last year with my aunt, her neighbour, and their young son, I spotted an Erythrina growing naturally close to the track, flowering profusely in amongst its healthy mop of emerging new leaves, which are curiously bat-wing shaped.
Until recently, a Flame tree grew in the front garden of my parent’s house, and so I’m inclined to choose it over the Erythrina — sentimentality too often receives bad press. Practicality is important, however, and so my choice between the two species will be based on which grows faster. If there’s nothing much between their rate of growth, then sentimentality will win out. Regardless of whatever decision is made, all four trees will find a place somewhere in my garden.
To be continued…
