Birds, Bees & Winter Blooms

A beautiful Swift Parrot feeding on winter blooms in Victoria. Photo from Atlas of Living Australia, provided by Birdlife Australia.

As the weather begins to cool off, you might start to miss the blooms of Spring/Summer, but do you have many Autumn/Winter flowering plants in your garden? Providing blooms during the cooler months can be a lifesaver for many of our native birds and bees. In fact, there are parrot species that migrate all the way from Tasmania to our region, to feed on the Autumn/Winter blooms in our woodlands (e.g. Swift Parrot, Orange-bellied Parrot). If you want to introduce cooler weather blooms into your garden, why not try these:

If you have space for a larger tree - Grey Box (Eucalyptus microcarpa), Red Ironbark (Eucalyptus tricarpa), Blackwood (Acacia melanoxylon).
If you have space for a smaller tree - Blue Mallee (Eucalyptus polybractea), Green Mallee (Eucalyptus viridis), Silver Banksia (Banksia marginata).
If you have space for shrubs: Rock Correa (Correa glabra), Common Correa (Correa reflexa), Spreading Wattle (Acacia genistifolia).
Or to extend the flowering season of many of our wildflowers/ground covers: water them a minimum of once a week, continuing into Autumn, and they will keep putting on their beautiful blooms for you. Great species for this are the Hoary Sunray (Leucochrysum albicans), Common Everlasting (Chrysosephalum apiculatum) and Fan Flower (Scaevola aemula). Try these plants in your garden and our native birds and bees will likely show up to thank you.

The prickly Spreading Wattle (Acacia genistifolia) also makes a brilliant hiding place for a little birds (such as the always gorgeous Superb Fairy Wren) to escape predators. Photo by I. Sutton — The prickly Spreading Wattle (*Acacia genistifolia*) also makes a brilliant hiding place for a little birds (such as the always gorgeous Superb Fairy Wren) to escape predators. Photo by I. Sutton

By Landscape Architect Melissa Stagg, of Stagg Design Landscape Architecture, Shepparton.