The Rebel Gardener » Garden Plants

Banksia Oblongifolia

Rebel Gardener — Mon, 17 May 2010 04:59:23 +0000

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 [...]

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Banksia Seminuda Flowers

Rebel Gardener — Sat, 15 May 2010 03:34:51 +0000

Banksia Seminuda is a tree that can grow up to 25 m in it’s natural habitat growing alongside streams in Western Australia. Unfortunately though, it is rarely seen in cultivation as it does have some very desirable features such as it’s adaptability to different soil types, it’s reasonably fast growth rate and of course it’s [...]

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Pruning your Alyogyne Huegelii

Rebel Gardener — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 01:19:33 +0000

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 [...]

Pruning your Alyogyne Huegelii is a post from: The Rebel Gardener

Growing Agave Attenuata in a Pot

Rebel Gardener — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 06:56:44 +0000

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 [...]

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Eremophila “Big Poly”

Rebel Gardener — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 22:48:33 +0000

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 [...]

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Eremophila Images

Rebel Gardener — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 22:02:22 +0000

Eremophilas are a very variable genus of plants. They vary in size from prostrate ground covers to small shrubby trees, that vary in the colour of foliage from grey white to deep greens and also in flower colours which includes white, blue, purple, green, yellow, red, pink and apricot etc. Here’s just a few of [...]

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Isopogon Formosus

Rebel Gardener — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 02:47:10 +0000

Isopogon Formosus is a plant that you probably won’t find in many plant nurseries. It’s mainly restricted to Australian Native Plant nurseries probably because it can be considered in some circles to be difficult to grow. I’d successfully grown it before in my last garden so when I came across it about a year ago [...]

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Eremophila “Eyre Princess”

Rebel Gardener — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 00:03:25 +0000

Eremophilas would have to one one of my favourite garden plants and one of my favourite Eremophilas would have to be Eremophila “Eyre Princess”. It’s now the beginning of spring in Melbourne and my Eremophila “Eyre Princess” is now at the height of it’s flowering season. At the moment it is just covered in purplely, [...]

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Grevillea “Pink Ice”

debbie — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 00:43:16 +0000

Grevillea Pink Ice, a Gem amongst the Gravel. One of my favourite things to do where shopping for plants is to search through the “sale” plants at the back of the nursery. Not only because sometimes you can pick up a bargain but also because sometimes you can find a gem in amongst the rubbish. [...]

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Alyogyne Huegelii

debbie — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 23:05:08 +0000

Alyogyne Huegelii, aka the Native Hibiscus, is a shrub that you see from time to time in nurseries but rarely see in home gardens. I’ve often found this quite surprising though as it’s has so many great things going for it. It grows naturally in sandy and gravelly soils in arid areas of Western Australia. [...]

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Grevillea Petrophiloides

Rebel Gardener — Wed, 15 Jul 2009 02:48:28 +0000

Grevillea Petrophiloides is a Grevillea that really breaks the typical Grevillea stereotype. When most people look at it for the first time they could quite easily be forgiven for mistaking it for a Bottlebrush or maybe even a Hakea. The plant itself is quite rounded and bushy but where it differs from the “typical Grevillea” [...]

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Brachychiton Rupestris, the Queensland Bottle Tree

Rebel Gardener — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 07:29:56 +0000

The first time I ever saw Brachychiton Rupestris aka the Queensland Bottle Tree, was in nursery. I remember looking at the label and thinking it looked quite a bit like the Boab tree from Northern Australia and thinking that this wouldn’t grow very well with the cool winters we get here in Melbourne. I then [...]

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Bonsai Bottle Tree

Rebel Gardener — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 07:26:03 +0000

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 [...]

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Euphorbia

Rebel Gardener — Mon, 06 Jul 2009 04:04:11 +0000

s far

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Grevillea Rosmarinifolia

Rebel Gardener — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 00:31:16 +0000

Yesterday a reader left a comment about Grevillea Rosmarinifolia on my article, Grevillea, How to grow. “I want to plant a fence line with the Grevillea Rosmarinifolia as I believe they are hardy and also have spiky leaves which will provide a barrier from unwanted people climbing the fence. I will require about 100 plants [...]

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Agave

Rebel Gardener — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 02:34:32 +0000

It wasn’t until I started my new garden that I looked at growing Agaves. After I finished landscaping my front garden I decided I only wanted to fill it with plants that could survive only on rainfall and without any supplemental watering at all (once established). This was a tall order to place on most [...]

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Agave potatorum

Rebel Gardener — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 02:28:31 +0000

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 [...]

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Agave attenuata

Rebel Gardener — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 02:24:27 +0000

Agave attenuata certainly is an Agave that has become quite popular in Australian gardens in recent times. It’s large fleshy leaves really are quite attractive. The only problem with this plant is that as it grows a trunk it tends to fall over. Because of this though it is probably best to give it some [...]

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Silky Oak, what you really need to know

Rebel Gardener — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 06:23:21 +0000

Grevillea Robusta aka the Silky Oak The Grevillea Silky Oak is not only one of the most popular Grevilleas in cultivation but it also does have some features that are quite desirable. It does tolerate badly drained soils such as clay and will also tolerate some phosphorus toxicity in the soil as I’ve discovered in [...]

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Grevillea Robusta, an alternative way to grow.

Rebel Gardener — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 06:22:53 +0000

In my last article about Grevillea Robusta, the Silky Oak, I wrote about the fact that seed grown trees often take some years to flower and the possibility that trees propagated from cuttings may actually flower a lot sooner. The other issue with Grevillea Robusta is the fact that most of the flowers are held [...]

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