My Grass Tree No.7 is in the ground in the new garden area

and it has been raining.

There is nothing like a few negative ions to perk a plant up!

You can see the little plants growing at the base of the trunk.

Pretty cute eh!

GT no. 7 is an Australian Native plant Xanthorrhoea Johnsonii#(N)

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Previously I posted a few photo's of caterpillars eating my

Crown of Thorns*(E) plant

The caterpillars (4) turned into cocoons in the last

week of April 08.

This photo below is the the moth which emerged.

Achaea-janata has quite a lovely tail section!
(oops! he lost that bit of his left wing when I tried to photograph his hind-wings)

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Tally 89 + 7 = 96

(two doubtful- seedlings not thriving)

Cheers

Updates:

This update is of the Grass Tree who lives down the road...

It has been flowering for about 3 weeks, with more little flowers opening each day!

*click on photo to enlarge*

This photo shows my total number of baby Grass Trees in yogurt pots!

89 in total, nearly all a single plant in each pot.

Some of the pots have 2 seeds in one pot and one with 3 seeds.

2 pots are in waiting !

This photo shows the newest sprout there in the center front.and directly behind it is one in doubt ... it is not thriving ! Quite a thin stringy little seedling especially when compared to the one on the left of it. Now that is a strong little one !
*click to enlarge photo*

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Tally 89+7= 96

Cheers

I thought this was interesting...

An older article from the Magnetic Times Newspaper link

July 17th 2007Smoking grass trees
The "Stick lease," a 1538m2 tract of land formerly associated with an oyster lease and noted for its superb grass trees, Xanthorrhoea johnstonii, near Magnetic Island's West Point, was the scene last week for an unusual NAIDOC (National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee) activity.
The land is under Department of Natural Resources and Water management and is currently being used cooperatively by Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service and Wulgurukaba., Magnetic Island's Traditional Owners, who teamed up with staff from QPWS and other government agencies to conduct a controlled burn. According to Wulgurukaba's Mr Michael Johnson, who is also a Magnetic Island based QPWS Officer, "Fire has been used by indigenous people for thousands of years to manage country. It's been very important for (government) agencies to come together, contribute and assist in this management."

The burnt results:

You can see a silhouette of the traditional owner/ranger in the smoke.

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Tally... I've still got 96....

(89 seedlings +7 plants =96)

Cheers

I Found these old,old black and white Photo's on the www

Here

(*click to enlarge*)

Gosh check out the size of these beauties!

The photo's are part of the Powerhouse Museum collection.

The date on the collection says these were taken in 1900.

The gentleman in the photo is holding a gigantic flower spear.

The format is *glass plate negative*

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On this one a couple of men are sitting up in the dead tree looking into the distance...

I wonder if there were more Grass Trees, These must have been really old trees in 1900, imagine how many seeds would have been in those flower spears.

These are wonderful photo's, it's so amazing being able to find this sort of info on the www.

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Another little seed popped up on Monday, that is No. 89

89 seedlings + 7 = 96

Cheers

This photo from the WWW is from Rockingham ...

The Grass Trees look as if they are dancing in tutu's

*click to enlarge*

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My neighbour - one week later...

more flowers have opened!

It's really hard to see, but there was a tiny native bee hovering on the left side.

*Click on photo to enlarge*

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Tally is still 95
88 seedlings+7= 95
(although 1 seedling is not thriving!)

Cheers

My Neighbour is Flowering!

Look there are tiny flowers on the spear!

*click photo to enlarge*

I first noticed this plant around the 3/4/08 so it has taken

approx. 5weeks to reach this stage.

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The plantlets or seeds growing around the base of this

Grass Tree No.7 are growing nicely.

An area in the garden is being prepared and this plant should go in there in about 3 weeks.

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I thought this little plant (below) would die,I just touched the green top lightly and it broke off at earth level in the pot...

I suspect it had root rot or something like that!
this meant I'm was back to 86 seedlings...

But two more came up yesterday so now I have 88 seedlings

...not counting the ones around the pot above because I didn't actually propagate them!

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Tally 95

88 seedlings+7= 95

Cheers

Information Links

I thought I would put some links to the websites I've found useful and interesting.

Sites which have helped me to grow my baby Grass Trees.

Monica’s site: Here

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YARRALUMLA NURSERY – GARDEN ADVICE SERIES

Here

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Australian plants On-Line : Here

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Parks Victoria Grass Tree, Fact File
Here

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Aboriginal Uses of Native Plants

Here

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Tally still 94

(although the one I'm doubtful about looks a bit sick!)
Cheers

Two new Sprouts... are 86 and 87

*click to enlarge*

1. Planted 5/Apr./08 - Up 3/May/08 = 29 days...gosh!

2. Planted12/Apr?08- Up 5/May/08 = 24...not as long!

It's is cooler at night now 10-16 C. so I think this is a fairly acceptable period of germination. I have been setting my seedlings out in the early morning sunshine for an hour (approx.) The plants normally live under my back veranda in the shade. I usually water them daily with a spray bottle or give them a tablespoon of water for a good drenching once a week. This is a hit or miss affair and I just go with how I think they are looking...maybe if they look a bit dry I give a few extra squirts!!

They are pretty cute though!

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This Photo from the WWW it's called Dancing Blackboys...sorry I've mislaid the link. Google 'grass trees blogs' and it's in there?

This one also from the WWW and called Persistance, see how the plant is growing out from the rock! Tough little dude!

This trio is clearly very old...

I wonder if they are ok... it looks as if there is a fence and concrete in the background of the photo so they have may transplanted to this site!! The one on the right looks pretty good though!

*Click to enlarge*

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Tally still 94 in total.

Cheers

Over this weekend...

I have re-potted my No.5 & 6 Grass trees.

No.6 (on the Left)has really long leaves for a small plant.

No. 5 has an upright stance.

I used Australian Native pot mix from Big W.

I was very careful not to disturb the roots ...they hate it!!

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A Caterpillar Update!

They have all got cocoons!

*click to enlarge*

I have numbered then to show which ones took the plunge first!

They are expected out in the spring...

I have to separate them and take photo's of each too identify which

moths come from which cocoons!

The caterpillar with the white on it's head is in cocoon No.2.

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Tally 2 new babies = 87 ... (Pic's later)
87+7 =94

Cheers

Beautiful and Strange Photo's from the W.W.W

A forest of spears!

*click to enlarge any photo*

Now this IS the strange one !

John Waine's Link

In this one we can see the new plants growing around the base of these 'adult' plants. Some of the smaller plants in the area have quite large spears too!

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Cheers

Yesterday ...

I added this photo to show this tiny little plant which is the one most likely to fail!

(go on prove me wrong, ...please)

It was planted at the same time as his/her pot-partner!,

Alas I tried to delete a line and the whole blooming photo disappeared!

(click to enlarge)

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Caterpillar update -

This photo shows the white spots on this resident in the insect house.

That leafy thing there on the stalk is a pupa wrapped into the dry leaves found hanging on the plant. I added the whole stalk to the insect house.

Here we see a green leaf added to cocoon, under that leaf is the white spotted caterpillar from the previous photo, and it happened overnight! What a little cheater, used most of his companions cocoon and only added 1 leaf!!! (the small green leaf above the flashed yellow leaf)

You can also see another (3) Caterpillar having a chew on the leaf at the top of the photo, this one has No white on it's head.
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Tally still 84+7=91

Cheers