Outing Report - 4 Nov, 2018 - Ian and Margaret Clarke's Property “Bundara”, Biddeston

An early start meant that we foregathered at Bundara at 7.00am – just as well, as it was quite a warm day! Ian commenced proceedings by giving us an overview of the history of the property, the existing vegetation and the various plantings that had been put in.

Ian has an interest in oaks and has planted a collection over 30 species in number on the property. During our walk around, we saw but a fraction of these. There was of course an English oak Quercus robur, but I made a note of a few others amongst an impressive array. Q.coccifera, the Kermes oak is from the Mediterranean. It hosts the kermes scale insect from which a red dye called 'crimson' was derived. Another that caught my attention was Q.variabilis, the Chinese Cork Oak, which, like its European counterpart, can produce cork.

The existing native trees are dominated by eucalypts, in particular Eucalyptus orgadophila, the Mountain Cool-ibah, E.tereticornis, the Forest Red Gum, and Corymbia tesselaris, the Carbeen/Moreton Bay Ash. I also noted E.sideroxylon, the Mugga/Red Ironbark, and E.meliodora, the Yellow Gum.

There followed a bewildering array of native plantings with a list running into the hundreds, which is a tremen-dous achievement. I will just comment on a few that caught my eye or piqued my interest. Acacia pendula is the wattle with silvery 'weeping' foliage. Atalaya salicifolia (Scrub Whitewood) was eye-catching due to the winged rachis between the leaflets. We saw three Brachychitons – B.populneus, the Kurrajong, B.discolor, the Lacebark, and B.rupestris, the Bottle Tree.

Ian showed us his pecan tree (USA) Carya illinoiensis, which yields little in the way of nuts for humans because the nuts all get eaten by the cockatoos!

We saw Ian's orchid which was briefly elusive as it was up in the fork of a tree, the orchid being Cymbidium canaliculatum, the Black Orchid/Tiger Orchid. We saw four species of Dodonaea including Dodonaea viscosa, which has in the past surprised us, being native also to Zimbabwe and New Zealand! Amongst the Flindersias we saw (I think there were four) was F.maculosa next to the driveway, in spectacular flower. This is another tree which has an attractive 'weeping' habit.

I was interested in Ian's Wilga, Geijera parvifolia.  I had heard that these can be difficult to propagate, but Ian said that his readily produces seedlings around the trees. The Glochidion ferdinandi (Cheese Tree) obligingly assisted with identification by bearing fruit in the shape of miniature cheese rounds which give it its common name. 

Ian has plantations of olives on the property – Olea europea. But he also has the African Olive, O. africanus (possibly a subspecies of the European olive) and, happily an Australian olive, namely, O.paniculata, the Native Olive. Also in the olive department we saw Notelaea linearis, the Narrow-leafed Mock Olive, which has a common name which I doubt is 'common'!

We saw Ozothamnus diosmifolius, the Rice Flower, so called because the flower buds resemble rice grains. Podocarpus elatus struck a familiar note as Podocarpus is well represented in southern Africa as is also Poly-scias. Ian has P. elegans. Zimbabwe has P. fulva.

A lovely splash of yellow colour was provided behind the dam wall by planted Senna artemisioides and S. coronilloides. Senna was previously 'Cassia', until the taxonomists decided to upset the apple cart and split the genus. The name 'artemisioides' is a reference to the appearance of the foliage which resembles that of Arte-misia absinthium, the notorious wormwood from which absinthe derived its flavour. We don't know if Ian has tried making absinthe from his Senna!

There were too many plantings to comment on all of them, but there was an interesting aside on the subject of planting trees. Ian confirmed that he has used road-kill roos in the planting holes over which the new tree is grown. He was asked if this makes a difference and he assured us that it has the trees 'jumping out of the ground'!

A lovely morning's walk in the garden and property was followed by lunch at the Biddeston School where we inspected the plantings of native trees around the oval in preparation for the school's 100^th anniversary.

Thank you to Ian and Margaret Clarke and to Sharon Wilson, principal at Biddeston School.

(Report by Philip Haxen)