WILDFLOWERS

6 August 2026 

Growing up in WA, it’s surprising that I don’t know more about wildflowers. I can identify the obvious ones (kangaroo paws, boronia, wattle, banksia) but not much more. It’s partly because I didn’t find the Australian bush attractive. I was much more interested in the green and pleasant lands of England even though they were only fictional at that time because I’d never been out of the country. It’s partly because the gardeners around me weren’t that interested in native plants. Auntie Dot, in the Porongorups, had a green house full of plants such as fushias and begonias and grew seasonal plants such as daffodils and jonquils in her garden. Betty was also a good gardener but she grew roses and lavender and hibiscus and oleanders.

With that in mind, when I saw a talk about wildflowers in Melville (a suburb close to Willagee), I signed up. The presentation was by a young botanist from UWA and she structured her stories around the six Noongar seasons:

• Currently Djilba – August-September: yellow flowing wattles
• Mambarang – October-November: peek wildflower season with orchids a speciality
• Birak – December-January:  WA Christmas tree or Modjar
• Bunuru – February-March: white flowering gums such as  jarrah and marri
• Djeran – April-May: red flowing gums and banksias
• Makuru – June-July: red & green kangaroo paws*

We learnt about how the structure of kangaroo paws lend themselves to being pollinated by wattlebirds; that the fruits of jarrah and marri are good food for black and red cockatoos; that the banksia is a collection of flowers but not all get pollinated and turn into fruits; that orchids have the smallest sees of any flowering plant on earth and need specific fungi below ground to grow; that WA’s poor soil makes it conducive to carnivorous plants that can get their nutrition from the insects they capture; that native bees particularly like blue and purple flowers.

You may already know all of this but I didn’t. Most of the photos the lecturer used to illustrate her talk had been taken in the Wireless Hill Park which is only 10 minutes’ drive from home so a couple of days after this presentation, Susan and I went for a walk in this urban bushland. There was a wonderful array of colours nestled in the bush from clumps of red and green kangaroo paws to single donkey orchids in yellow and fushia peeking through the foliage. There were plants with amusing names such as cockies tongue (coral bush) and running postman (because it’s the colour of postboxes), bacon and egg bush (although a couple of plants have been given that name). Other people were around, some taking photos, some just meandering, one practicing her hula hoop techniques. But not too many to take away from the pleasant ambience of easy bush walking. 

We are now planning to go back to Wireless Hill every month to check out the new flowering plants because we’ve got a long way to go to learn about all of them. There are, after all, 7-8,000 plants that are endemic to Western Australia!

* Dried Kangaroo Paws appeared as alien set decoration in Star Wares: The Force Awakens.