Native or Indigenous?

Native or Indigenous?

by | Jan 25, 2023 | Uncategorized

by Spencer Shaw

We’ve always been passionate about our Indigenous (local-native) plants and bringing them back into your gardens. I’d identify Indigenous (for the garden) to those plants’ native / naturally occurring in SEQLD. But Gardeners are a curious bunch, and always want to grow something from just over the horizon, so we also stock a range of cultivar natives and Australian Native’s, that is plants native to / naturally occurring throughout Australia.  However, Australia as we know is big, really big and diverse, very diverse and what grows naturally in South West Australia might be stunning in bloom, but has buckley’s chance of surviving in the humid subtropics of SE QLD and what grows naturally in the tropics of NE QLD may in fact become a weed when planted down here. I was reminded of this recently when visiting North Queensland and admiring the beautiful Umbrella Trees – Schefflera actinophylla in their natural habitat. Having killed so many in my career as a bush regenerator in SEQLD (where they are considered an environmental weed) over the last few decades, it was quite novel to see them in their natural habitat. That’s why at Forest Heart we encourage us of Indigenous /local-native plants and cultivar natives to avoid the spread of more ‘native’ weeds.

“But surely If I just plant Indigenous / local-native plants, then that is going to limit me, and I’ll have a boring garden” I hear you say. Well, lucky for you, we live in one of the worlds great Biodiversity Hot spots and we are blessed with thousands of different species of plants / Indigenous plants in our natural area that you can potentially use in your garden.  The Sunshine Coast Council area alone is home to over 1500 Indigenous plants and on a slightly wider scale SE Queensland is home to some 3000 Indigenous plants. So, with a palette of between 1500-3000 Indigenous plants gardeners in SE Queensland, gardeners have a plenty to choose from when it comes to making the most of our local flora for their horticultural endeavours!

Realistically, for our gardens, most of us are going to use native plants in the broader sense, but using Indigenous / local-native plants has the added benefit of providing habitat for a whole range of fauna that may have specific needs that these plants meet, and allows them to survive and move throughout the landscape.  There’s never been a better time to visit us at Forest Heart ecoNursery so we can help you create a backyard full of biodiversity, using Indigenous plants, that benefit not only you with their beauty, but the wildlife too!

I’ve lost my heart to “Bleeding Hearts”

I’ve lost my heart to “Bleeding Hearts”

by | Feb 26, 2019 | Flora, Gardening

With Spencer Shaw

Bleeding Heart Homalanthus populifolius

Sometimes a plant can be so common in your field of view that it’s easy to miss its significance and importance to ecosystems, it can so much a part of the landscape and so self sustaining that it can be forgotten in favour of all the rare and threatened plants and those things that are hard to grow, and so it is with your common run of the mill Homalanthus populifolius!

Homalanthus populifolius syn: Homalanthus nutans, Omalanthus populifolius has had a few name changes over the last few decades (just to keep us on our toes) and is a member of the Euphorbiaceae family, a very large Family of plants spread across the globe. It is dioecious – separate male and female plants.

This species is one of those ridiculously fast growing plants that kicks starts ecosystem change by colonising open ground, wether that be an opening in the forest, along roadsides, disturbed edges (and at our place just about anywhere and everywhere).  Favoured germination conditions are open ground with high light levels and reasonable moisture holding capacity in the soil. From seedling to mature and fruiting could be as little as 18-24 months. In open conditions they become a small tree up to 5-7 metres, but I have seen a few spectacular specimens topping 10 metres in lowland rainforest.

As for kick starting ecosystem change, within 24 months you can have a deep leaf litter providing shelter and habitat for macro invertebrates and all those critters that eat them; they are a tree that is often as wide as tall, providing shade and humidity for secondary rainforest plants to recruit; the fruit of Homalanthus populifolius is highly sort after by birds (particularly the Brown Cuckoo Dove Macropygia amboinensis on our property), who readily spread seed.

I love Homalanthus, it’s hard to imagine a rainforest planting being successful without them. They are our ultimate rainforest pioneer species and well worth planting – that is if they aren’t popping up by themselves!