One of my blogging friends, Tish, understood the nature of many Australian wildflowers when she said, in a comment on my last flower post “We’re not talking in-your-face ‘hosts of golden daffodils’ here. I suspect you have to do a bit of sleuthing and keeping your eyes peeled to come on all these lovely plants.” She was right. Many of the flowers featured in this post are tiny, and I need to keep my eyes slowly swivelling to spot them. Fortunately my default walking mode is slow: if I jogged I would see nothing.
This early morning flower walk began with a couple of macropods and their joeys, one with tail and paws dangling out of the pouch, ears finding a space around them; one watching me from the pouch with alert eyes. Then a movement in the bush turned into an emu, who took off in a hysterical ungainly leap when (s)he saw me.
The predominant flower colour on the headland in late September is white: creamy candles now taking on a cylindrical look; a flourishing of white flowers emerging from grass-like leaves under the twisted spotted gums; tiny many-petalled flowers in profusion on the ground; the hairy white flowers of the boobialla, berries not yet rich purple. A couple of bluey-purple Solanums offered a change of colour. Then there was a miscellanea of banksia cones, male toothed casuarina needles, curled monotoca leaves, the beginning of wattle pods, a madly budding and sunny-flowering hibbertia, and the exquisite filigree of a leaf skeleton.
The photographic triumph of the morning came towards the end of the walk. At last I've almost captured with clarity the miniature forest that is the flowering of moss. It was worth lying flat on the ground amongst potential leeches and ticks to capture the minute green cylindrical bobbles on slender red stems.
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Lucid Gypsy said:
Wow, a fantastic morning walk I loved every moment and I hope you didn’t take a tick home.
Are the ones that look like bivalves the wattle pods? Your miniature red trunked forest is perfect.
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morselsandscraps said:
The bivalves are banksia cones: the wattle pods are the whitish things twirling out from a centre in the same collage. No ticks – I strip at the front door, bung the clothes in the washing machine and shower straight away. That stops the little bastards!
I revisited Mullimburra yesterday. I first (and last) walked here with Christine, just before she left for the trip on which she visited you. Magnificent coastline and huge waves on a peerless blue and gold afternoon. And memories.
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pommepal said:
A delightful gallery of the dainty Australian wild flowers. I especially liked the first photo, they almost look like snowdrops, but I’m sure they aren’t…
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morselsandscraps said:
The first photo is a cluster of the flowers in the first photo of the collage below: I think it’s Libertia paniculata aka branching grass flag. You don’t often see such a concentrated display in the bush, and the spotted gum background is a bonus.
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Elissaveta said:
Your post reminds me of my recent Swiss holidays. In the mountains above Zermatt (the home of the famous Matterhorn), we followed many trails, one of which was called Blumenweg – the flower trail. There were information panels depicting what you could see all along the way. It wasn’t blooming season and I suspect the trail would look fabulous in spring or early summer but I found the concept brilliant, especially for those curious, observant, flower lovers such as you. I think you’d have loved it. 🙂
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morselsandscraps said:
Oh temptation! Alpine meadows remind me of “Heidi”, a favourite book as a child. I’m charmed by the idea of a flower trail – especially one with labels. Although I’d be a bit disconcerted to find my bush-flowers labelled. Are you going to blog about your Swiss walking?
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Elissaveta said:
I have only written about my experience up the Klein Matterhorn, I remember you reading it. I really should’ve written more about other trails and memorable moments – maybe I still will. Have you been?
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morselsandscraps said:
No, sadly. My overseas travel is limited. Egypt, Jordan and poor Syria and then Poland, with a quick three-week dash through Croatia, Slovenia, Budapest, Vienna and Prague en route for my 70th birthday treat / challenge. Started late!
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Elissaveta said:
Well that is still a good list! I can only imagine you’d have to cram everything into one holiday given how far you come from every time. You could probably also do Germany and around next time you visit your daughter?
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Heyjude said:
Lots of pretties and the moss looks good close-up. You have reminded me to take the macro lens moss-hunting. Fortunately we don’t have too many ticks around here.
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morselsandscraps said:
Moss isn’t as good as I’d like, but I suspect it’s as good as I’ll get unless I buy a new one. I look forward to your moss-hunting with your macro.
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restlessjo said:
I love you getting up close and personal with the flora. 🙂 I would have liked photos of the fauna too but your description of the joey and his emu friend is priceless.
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morselsandscraps said:
I had photos of emu and macropod, but they were pretty blurry. A new camera to weigh me down maybe? I wouldn’t have caught the emu’s mad pirouette, but the stay-at-home joey, yes.
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restlessjo said:
Sounds like me and red squirrels in Krakow 🙂
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Suzanne said:
What an interesting account of a walk in the bush. Your spring is further advanced than ours – what a lot of pretty and delicate little flowers you spied.
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morselsandscraps said:
We’ve had another cold snap. There are wattles-in-waiting all over the place waiting for the magic of warmth. Are these flowers familiar to you in your part of the world? Once I spy one tiny flower, my eye seems to attune and I notice a lot more.
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Suzanne said:
I am familiar with some of them. The spring flowers are slow down here this year. It warms up for a day or two then anothercold change blows in – like today. The wind is freezing.
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Olga said:
Wonderful capturing of the delicate beauties of your nature walk.
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morselsandscraps said:
“Delicate beauties” says it well – most smaller than a 10c piece, and some only 3mm.
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Wren said:
Lovely photographs, and writing! Sounds like a magical walk.
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morselsandscraps said:
I’m always surprised on my walks. I think “I’ve been here so often. I’ve seen it all” and I never have.
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