"Chookie" wrote in message
news:ehrebeniuk-E23B41.22473626092007@news...
In article ,
"Flowergirl" wrote:

Following up as I'm apparently too verbose to post a comment at your
blog....
Great garden description ... (and I say *yes* to a digital camera, even
if
only I get to finally see a pic of *you* in your garden to put a face to
the
name).
Do you know the species of tea-tree that was native to the area? I know
a
few good Qld species that do OK on heavy clays (and possibly
M.quinquenervia
would also be OK in NSW) and wonder what the NSW species are that are
found
in the western Sydney area.... M.thymifolia? M.nodosa? M.erubescens?
M.decora? M.linariifolia (sp?)? other spp???

M. decora and M. nodosa, principally. Most of the others do well here
too,
along with bottlebrushes. The pity is that most plant breeding work has
gone
into Sydney sandstone species, which generally don't cope in western
Sydney.

I'm still waiting for someone to bring out Acacia pubescens (Downy Wattle)
commercially. It's a small (3m) wattle, with pretty blue-green ferny
leaves,
and scented flowers. Perfect for today's smaller gardens! The problem is
propagation -- it tends to sucker rather than grow from seed, and seed
viability is really low (I suppose tissue-culture must be too expensive?).

I guess that depends on how well a commercial propagator will think the
nursery plants will sell.

Actually, there are a lot of plants like that that I *want* but can't easily
get for want of a commercial propagator.

One thing about the drought is that I do seem to be seeing a wider range of
native plants being offered for sale at our local nursery.

Amanda
(who's just been told that for our tenth wedding anniversary (today) we're
off to pick up a Wollemia nobilis ... a fine example of a vegetatively
propagated plant that appears to be selling well