The Rebel Gardener

If you’d like to discover the Magic of Australian Native Plants then GROW WHAT WHERE will make your Plant Selection Simple and Easy so you Can’t Go Wrong . . When I first came across the gardening book “Grow What Where” it was at a very opportune time. We’d just bought a new house that [...]

Gardening in Clay Soil is often regarded as somewhat of a handicap by most gardeners, especially those gardeners that have preference for growing plants that do require a well drained soil. Most of the popular West Australian natives and South African Proteas that naturally grow in sand and well draining gravels and loams have a [...]

Banksia Oblongifolia, native to Queensland and New South Wales, is another Banksia that isn’t often seen in cultivation and home gardens. I first came across it about 10 years ago and planted it in my mother’s garden where it grew into a narrow spindly shrub about 1.5 m tall that probably only ever had about [...]

How to Prune Alyogyne Huegelii and other Australian Native Plants. From time to time I get emails about pruning Australian Native Plants and the feeling I quite often get is that there are many gardeners that have a misconception that Australian Natives don’t like to be pruned. And this really couldn’t be further from the [...]

Agaves are plants that lend themselves to be easily grown in pots and Agave attenuata is no exception. Because of it’s drought tolerance it’s a plant that won’t drop dead if you forget to water it every second day over summer. Another great thing about Agave attenuata is that it’s really easy to propagate from [...]

When I first came across Eremophila Big Poly (E Bignoniiflora x E Polyclada) I thought of it more as just another addition to my collection and just grew it in a pot for about 2 years. It wasn’t until I planted it into the ground though, that it actually came into it’s own. The first [...]

Rain Barrels are these days becoming very popular with gardeners as they come to realize the benefits of using rainwater in their garden as opposed to tap water. One important fact about rain barrels is that they can fill quite quickly with rainwater and then overflow, so in some respects they aren’t the most efficient [...]

Growing a windbreak can help drought proof your garden and one of the quickest ways to achieve this result is to water the plants you’ve selected as your windbreak much as possible. So what I’m doing is using water and in the case rainwater to ultimately save water in my garden. One of the things [...]

In my article about “How to Bonsai Australian native plants” I wrote about my Brachychiton rupestris, aka the Queensland Bottle Tree, that I’d been growing in a pot for sometime. I was contemplating turning it into a Bonsai. Now as I’ve said before I’ve always liked Bonsai but never had the patience to do it [...]

Agave potatorum is the first Agave I ever bought, as I remember I was attracted to the bluey coloured leaves. The great thing about this Agave is that it is really easy to propagate from. It grows lots of pups and has been propagated from now about 3 times. In the photo above the original [...]