WEEDS ARE always with us. Whether they have jumped the garden fence or been deliberately introduced for another purpose, their control occupies much time and consumes substantial financial resources.
The Nursery and Garden Industry Australia, NGIA, has been developing the Grow Me Instead program and has published guides for each state and territory. With input from many sources, thirty invasive plants have been identified for the subtropics along with a range of suggested superior alternatives. The invasive plant lists are basically a starting point as many other plants are being monitored for their invasive potential. Don’t expect to find your well known weedy vines on the list as it focusses on currently used garden plants.
The website www.growmeinstead.com.au has a map to identify the bioregions, and prompts for the invasive plants and their recommended non-invasive alternatives. Photos are included and some readers may be surprised at what is now known to be invasive.
Not all recommended alternatives are native plants and some may be undesirable for reasons other than weed potential. The Council publication “Take Another Look…Our Locals are Beauties” is another useful source of information. Barung has copies and can help with professional advice. While Barung’s main focus has always been on revegetation, local plants suited to the garden are stocked. Soil type, rainfall, the presence of a pollinator and many other factors can influence the weed potential of a particular plant. It is always worth consulting local people with local experience. Barung for example, would not recommend Queensland Maple, Flindersia brayleyana, as its winged seeds can certainly spread. An alternative large tree would be the Pepperberry Tree, Cryptocarya obovata, with its rusty hairy foliage. It is flowering now.
We are fortunate to have national parks and state forests in our area and need to be aware that birds and other animals can distribute seeds into nearby bushland and rainforest fringes. There is much more information available than in the past, giving us the opportunity to avoid costly, time consuming, weedy mistakes.
BARUNG NATIVE PLANT NURSERY
Nursery opening times: Wednesday, Thursday, Friday – 9am -3pm
Riverside Centre office hours: 9am to 4pm (Re-opens January 11). Next to Maleny Post Office, Riverside Centre
Phone 5494 3151
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