8 0417 294 778 A Touch of Grass Garden Care GARDEN CLEANUPS / REJUVENATION & MAKEOVERS A SPECIALTY We offer an experienced, professional and reliable service Call Jeremy on ... Est. Gold Coast since 2001 Let us create your new and rejuvenated garden where you can sit back, relax and enjoy your tranquil surroundings ... Specialising Garden Makeovers & Rejuvenation * Garden Care * Plant Selection * Soft Landscaping Gold Coast Regional Botanic Gardens, Rosser Park, 232 Ashmore Rd, Benowa Visit www.friendsgcrbg.org.au or www. facebook.com/friendsgcrbg Two South American garden beauties highlight the contrast between plants growing naturally across a wide area in different habitats, to those with very distinct and limiting growing requirements. Naturally occurring widely in tropical woodlands of Brazil to Central America the striking deep blue to violet racemes of Dichorisandra thryisifolia Blue Ginger ushers the beginning of Autumn. Its similarity to ginger provides its common name, but the plant is not a ginger at all and belongs instead to the Commelinaceae Family. First introduced into Australian gardens in William Macarthur’s Camden Nursery Catalogue in 1857, it proved unable to survive frost and cold and was delegated to heated greenhouses in cooler areas of the southern states. Enjoying the warmth of coastal areas and in Northern NSW and Queensland It has been recorded as an invasive garden escapee in some areas, a consequence of garden refuse being dumped illegally. The large, spirally arranged leaves along segmented stems stand out best against the sheltered and shady backdrop of a fence or wall. Blue ginger produces new stems on underground rhizomes and left unpruned can develop a dense clump that can be split and divided. It readily propagates from the stem. Rare, and now listed by the International Union of Conservation in Nature (IUCN) as Critically Endangered in the wild, the beautiful Worlseya procera Empress of Brazil is equally rare (and expensive) for gardeners to locate. While its pale lilac flower is beautiful it is fickle in flowering, and alone, the Gardening by Kate Heffernan Honorary Life Member Friends of GCRBG, Botanic Garden Consultant arching, recurved leaves that grow from a bulb are not particularly attractive. Its major threats include illegal collection and fire. Its story is not unlike that of Blue Ginger, discovered for plant science and gardening by 19th C explorers and botanists. Unlike widespread Blue Ginger it is found only in a very limited area of less than 70 sq km. Now almost extinct in nature it grows naturally on misty mountain peaks and cliff edges in Brazil, above 1200m altitude. The world of gardening has not been kind to some species after their discovery. Some have the potential to become weeds away from their natural places or where there are no natural predators, others are so rare as to be collected almost to extinction.
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