Magpies are often considered annoying and vicious due to their terrifying aerial assaults, which occur when some males protect their young during September and October. Despite this, magpies actually received the honour of being crowned Australia’s Bird of the Year according to the Guardians poll conducted in 2017. Childhood memories ...
Noisy Miners are an Australian native honeyeater that can cause quite a ruckus in your garden with their noisy calls. They feed mainly on nectar, fruits and insects, and live in areas of woodland, open forest and on habitat edges. They are often confused with the Common or Indian Myna which is an introduced species […]
Magpies are often considered annoying and vicious due to their terrifying aerial assaults, which occur when some males protect their young during September and October. Despite this, magpies actually received the honour of being crowned Australia’s Bird of the Year according to the Guardians poll conducted in 2017. Childhood memories of older Australians include being […]
Native bees are an essential component to our natural environment and our very existence. Without their services as pollinators many plant species would not be able to reproduce and productivity of our agricultural food crops would suffer. Australian native bees are able to pollinate many of our fruits and vegetables in our home gardens, along […]
As usual the calendar tells us Spring arrives in the first week of September and many gardeners or those wishing to establish trees on rural properties believe for best results they plant as soon as Spring has arrived. For nearly four decades I have been advising clients that if they want the very best […]
Autumn is a great time to enact tree planting projects or to replace those depleted or dead plants that have suffered from either old age or harsh summer conditions. Autumn is also a great time to enjoy the colours provided by deciduous trees. Many people are unaware that the Illawarra region is home to two […]
This myth really irks me! Wherever I go I hear the same old, same old – that native plants are short-lived. Yet, in front of my eyes I constantly see beautiful 400 year old Eucalyptus; Wattles that are over a hundred years old; Paperbarks that have seen the centuries pass by, along with Banksias, Bottlebrush […]
This summer was a particularly difficult season for many traditional gardeners throughout the highlands. Being the fourth warmest summer on record along with a very dry winter/spring. Extreme temperatures were experienced this summer with January having 11 days above 30 and February 8 days. After an exceptional start last Autumn (311mm of rain received in March) we had only 40% of […]
The Problem with Leylandii Whilst not declared an environmental weed in this Shire (Yet!), this plant is certainly an undesirable, nuisance plant in the Southern Highlands and many other areas. We are not alone in this opinion. Earlier this year at a Wingecarribee Council meeting, many concerns about the extensive use of this plant in […]
We have caught wind of a rumour this week that the Southern Highlands doesn’t have any native gardens worthy of note. Our extensive client base in the Highlands and the long list of native gardens we have personally established would refute this rumour. The traditional Southern Highlands exotic garden is very formal and requires huge […]
All plants require a good balance of nutrients in the soil to thrive and native plants are certainly no exception. Native plants have adapted to thrive on our older (low nutrient) soils and work in conjunction with soil bacteria to utilise all available nutrients. It is more important to have a healthy, living soil than […]
