Grevilleas are a fantastic source of nectar for birds. In fact some flowers can be so laden with sweet nectar that it will drip from the flowers early in the morning, and this is a good opportunity to sample some of the sugary syrup yourself just as Aborigines have done for centuries.

Naturally, other flowering plants can also be used to attract birds, but none come close to the success of grevilleas. They have co-evolved with our native nectar-feeding birds and are perfect partners. The grevilleas provide food for the birds in the form of rich nectar, and in return the birds transport pollen from one flower to the next. It’s so simple yet effective.

Humans benefit in two ways – we enjoy providing a buffet for our native feathered friends, watching their antics as they dine, and the colourful splash they bring to the garden.  Grevillea flowers come in a large range of colours and forms, decorating and adding allure to any garden.

There are a large number of grevilleas available that do well in the tropics as long as you have a well-drained spot to grow them in. The traditional cultivars come with names as colourful as their flowers. Strawberry blonde, orange marmalade, pink surprise, moonlight, honey gem and misty pink, just to name a few. There are also wild grevillea species such as shiressii, venusta, formosa and pteridifolia, which may be a little difficult to find in most nurseries, but are definitely worth searching for. Surprisingly even Yuruga Nursery may not have these species all of the time so you need to be diligent if you’re after something very special.

So there you have it, it’s easy to attract native birds to your garden – simply plant a couple of grevilleas. You’ll be surprised by the number of native birds that will visit while they are in flower.

Happy gardening.

Marcus Achatz
Yuruga Nursery

(Published in Cairns City Life magazine, February 2008)

Fortunately that’s all a load of bull. Sure, you can plant a native bush garden like I’ve described, and there is nothing wrong with that, but by no means are you restricted to such a dull selection of plants, nor will you have to give up the lush green foliage or the colourful flowers. And surprise, all those plants I said were now off limits are also available as natives.

There are at least five species of native cordylines in our rainforests, over 20 species of hibiscus and hibiscus-like shrubs and half a dozen North Queensland gardenias including Gardenia macgillivraei with its fragrant white flowers. There are also many native gingers including the spectacular red leafed Alpinia caerulea and Alpinia arctiflora with its showy snow white flowers. So you see, native gardens aren’t about dieting, they’re actually about choosing “Australian made” rather than imported. You can plant your lush foliage, bright flowers and tropical plants until your garden’s bursting at the fence line and spilling into your neighbours yard.

In my opinion, growing natives shouldn’t be penance for past misdeeds, and you shouldn’t be doing it because you feel you have to, like eating bran. Give it a try, you’ll be pleasantly surprised by the wonderful range of tropical plants ‘local’ to our region. Your garden will be the envy of those on a diet of foreign foliage, and native birds and butterflies will have a feast.

Marcus Achatz
Yuruga Nursery

(Published in Cairns City Life magazine, December 2007)

The focus of this article is for gardeners in tropical Australia.
However, the basic principles apply for throughout Australia
with minor modifications for local conditions.

Solving the Myna Bird Problem (and sparrows as well) ..

Myna Birds are a terrible pest in gardens in north Queensland . They are aggressive and destructive, and when they move into your garden they drive every other bird out. The number of articles that have appeared in the local media lately gives an indication of the seriousness of the problem. All sorts of remedies are being advocated, including a gassing machine to catch and destroy the birds. For nature lovers this is a drastic and quite alarming solution.

There’s actually a very simple solution, which native plant lovers have known for years .. plant native plants!

Native plants provide habitat for native birds, and if you have a strong, stable and well-established population of native birds in your garden, Myna birds will not be able to establish there.

The trick is to have a sufficiently large and established population of native birds in the garden so that force of numbers and established territory makes the garden an unattractive place for the Myna birds to move into.

Native birds need native plants if they are to live permanently in your garden, so the secret of building up a strong and permanent population of native birds in your garden is to plant sufficient native plants in the right balance. You need to provide both food and shelter, and to cater for fruit and insect eating birds as well as honeyeaters.

Include lots of honey-flora plants, making sure the plants you choose are suitable for your area. Popular honey-flora plants include grevilleas, callistemons, banksias, melaleucas, tea-trees, graptophyllums and eucalypts.

Also include plants that will provide food for the fruit and seed eaters. Figs and native Laurels are great for larger gardens.   In smaller gardens, the Little Evodia is a very sought-after seed-source, and the fruit of dianellas (flax lilies) are very popular food sources for native birds.

It’s all a matter of choosing suitable plants for your particular garden, so don’t be afraid to ask our expert retail staff for advice in selecting plants.

Native birds will not establish permanent populations in your garden unless you also provide adequate shelter and appropriate nesting sites, so you will need to include lots of lilly-pillies and other dense bushy plants. Make sure the plants you choose are suitable for your area so that they grow well and provide sufficient food and shelter.

Evidence gathered from gardeners over the years suggests that you need an area of about an acre, made up of at least 80% native plants. This may sound impossible, but the good news is that you don’t need to own an acre yourself. Birds don’t see man-made fences and so a group of like-minded neighbours with predominantly native gardens can easily achieve the same result.

The Yuruga Nursery property is surrounded by farming land which is regularly invaded by Myna birds. However, we have never had Myna birds at Yuruga, and this is due simply to the large and extensive native gardens and the permanent populations of an assortment of native birds at the nursery.

For more information on how to create a balanced native garden that will attract native birds to the exclusion of pest birds such as sparrows and Myna birds, call into Yuruga Nursery and pick up Information Sheet “Attracting Birds“.

There is something particularly beautiful about deciduous plants.

When they drop all their leaves and expose their bare skeletons to the world, they present an architectural grandeur that adds quite another dimension to the landscape.

In the tropics where it is basically warm all year round, deciduous trees mark the passage of the year. It’s definitely November when the Flame Trees throw off all their old leaves and litter the ground beneath with a thick layer of mulch, lying ready to decompose and recycle once the rains begin.

Who can begrudge the litter when the reward is a spectacle of architectural brilliance and fiery colour?
Soon the storms will come, and then the long awaited wet season ….

Brachychiton acerifolius

Flame Tree (Brachychiton acerifolius)
The Flame Tree is very familiar to most of us, since it is a native of our local north Queensland rainforests. It is actually very widespread in the wild, occurring in rainforests from Iron Range on Cape York Peninsula right down to the Wollongong region south of Sydney (where it is known as the Illawarra Flame Tree for obvious reasons).
The Flame Tree is hardy and easy to grow. It has large lobed leaves resembling maple leaves (hence the ‘acer-i-folius’ species name), and it usually flowers within a couple of years of planting.

The Flame Tree is a fantastic spectacle in flower since it drops every leaf and produces masses of brilliant red flowers. At this time of year you can’t miss them in gardens and dotted across the rainforest canopy throughout the region.

Melia azedarach

White Cedar (Melia azedarach)
The White Cedar is a very hardy and fast growing tree from low to medium rainfall rainforests right across tropical Australia.
It drops all its leaves in about June, and then produces masses of lovely purple/white flowers at the same time as it puts on its fresh coat of soft green new foliage. The flowers are an absolute delight amongst the fresh green leaves, and have a lovely scent.

The White Cedar is well known is forestry circles for its lovely timber. In cultivation it is extremely hardy, and grows into a superb shade tree even in very arid areas such as Alice Springs.

Eucalyptus platyphylla

Poplar Gum (Eucalyptus platyphylla)
The Poplar Gum is a well-known eucalypt of tropical Queensland. It is easy to identify by its open sprawling habit, large round leaves (like a poplar) and smooth white trunk.
The Poplar Gum is a very common tree of open forests in Eastern Queensland from about Rockhampton northwards. The old bark is shed each year to reveal a new trunk of the most exquisite salmon-pink, eventually hardening off to the familiar smooth white trunk.

This eucalypt is usually known as the Poplar Gum because of its unusual round leaves, but it is also sometimes referred to as the Ghost Gum because of its beautiful trunk, although it is not the same Ghost Gum as the famous trees of central Australia.

Unusual amongst the gum trees, this eucalypt is deciduous, shedding its leaves when it flowers. In a wet year it may only shed a few leaves, but in a particularly dry year it will drop the entire canopy. The bare branches bear masses and masses of fluffy white flowers which make a truly spectacular sight against a brilliant blue sky.

The sights and sounds of November in a tropical garden …..
…… splashes of brilliant red, black, yellow,
……. and a raucous cacophony of bird sound.

As you drive around, you can’t miss the fantastic Flame Trees (Brachychiton acerifolius) in gardens and in the rainforest everywhere.

Equally as stunning is the gem of the tropics, the Tree Waratah (Alloxylon flammeum), which is also in flower in November. As the common name implies, this beautiful plant is closely related to the well-known waratahs of southern Australia, and has huge red flowers. The flowers are borne on the ends of the branches and so a tree in flower makes a very showy display. In the wild, the natural distribution of the Tree Waratah is centred in and around (but not restricted to) the rainforests of the Eacham Shire and this spectacular tree has been adopted as the fitting official emblem of the shire.

Cassia sp Paluma Range

Native cassias are a blaze of yellow in November. In our Yuruga gardens we have Cassia sp Paluma Range and Cassia tomentella absolutely dripping with huge racemes of bright yellow – the native cassias are so lovely, and at least the equal of the common exotic cassias (or better, if you’re unashamedly biased like us!).

Black Cockatoo

The Black Cockatoos are providing a fantastic flash of shiny black and red as they move en masse from tree to tree, ripping and smashing at all the seed pods they can find. They are having a field day with the heavy crop of eucalypt seeds weighing down the gum trees, and they are also active almost at ground level feasting on the large woody pods of the local bush hakea Hakea persiehana.

November means noise in a tropical garden – Black Cockatoos with their mournful screech, Channel-billed Cuckoos (they sound like a model-T ford trying to start, don’t you think?), Koels trying desperately to make it rain, Spangled Drongos bossing everyone around, Blue-winged Kookaburras who were absent the day they gave laughing lessons … there’s nothing very delicate or melodious about the sounds of November!

With a bit of luck it will rain soon!