12 extraordinarily unique Australian native garden plants
The Australian flora contains some of the most structurally bizarre plants on earth. This is partly a function of age and partly a function of the extreme conditions they have had to adapt to.
jeans_Photos, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
The result is a collection of plants that are unique: flowers that appear to grow from leaves, seed pods that look like horned demons, entire canopies that erupt in stamens and bulbs that produce flowers from bare soil.
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1. Clay wattle (Acacia glaucoptera)
Clay wattle's flower buds emerge directly from the margins and midrib of each flat, wavy-edged 'leaf' in a line, as though growing from the surface. What looks like the leaf is a flattened stem, called a phyllode, which explains why the flowers bloom from it. The wavy, blue-grey phyllodes are themselves ornamental, giving the plant year-round structural interest quite unlike any other acacia.
Planting tip
Plant in full sun in free-draining sandy or gravelly soil. It is drought-tolerant once established and suits Mediterranean-climate gardens across WA and SA. Use a hori hori to prepare planting holes in sandy soil without over-disturbing the surrounding area. Keep fertilisers away from the root zone.
2. Hop bitter-pea (Daviesia latifolia)
Hop bitter-pea produces small yellow and red pea flowers that appear to erupt directly from the surface of flat, broad phyllodes — the same structural trick as clay wattle but in a completely different plant family. Daviesia's phyllodes are oval, dark green and spine-tipped, and the flowers cluster along the midrib. Like all legumes, it fixes atmospheric nitrogen through root nodules, making it a useful soil improver in the garden as well as a visual curiosity.
Macleay Grass Man, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Planting tip
Plant in free-draining soil in full sun to part shade. It tolerates moderate drought and light frost. Little maintenance is required — a light trim with sharp secateurs after flowering maintains a compact form. The spine-tipped phyllodes make thorn-proof gloves advisable when working close to the plant.
3. Winged bossiaea (Bossiaea heterophylla)
Bossiaea heterophylla takes the phyllode-flowering trick in yet another direction. The stems themselves are flattened into broad green wings. The small yellow and red pea flowers emerge directly from the surface of these winged stems in clusters, with no conventional leaf structure involved at all. It grows naturally in dry sclerophyll and heath across eastern Australia, where the flattened stems reduce water loss in the same way succulent stems do in other plant families.
Poyt448 Peter Woodard, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
Planting tip
Plant in free-draining soil in full sun to part shade. It suits heathland-style plantings and performs well in sandy or rocky soils low in nutrients. Use a hand fork when planting into established heath gardens to avoid disturbing surrounding root systems.
4. Drumsticks (Isopogon anemonifolius)
Drumsticks produces flower heads of such geometric perfection that they appear engineered. Each head is a dense, perfect sphere of yellow tubular flowers arranged with mathematical regularity around a central cone. After flowering, the spent cone hardens and is covered in silky hairs, giving rise to the common name. It belongs to the Proteaceae family, the same family as banksia and grevillea, and shares the family's characteristic structural complexity.
Planting tip
Plant in full sun in free-draining, sandy or gravelly soil. Keep fertilisers low in phosphorus — it shares the Proteaceae sensitivity to phosphorus excess. A light prune with sharp secateurs after flowering maintains a compact form.
Why Australian plants look so different
Australia separated from Gondwana approximately 35 million years ago and has been biologically isolated ever since. The result is a flora that has evolved in response to ancient, nutrient-poor soils, prolonged drought, fire and the absence of many of the herbivores and pollinators that shaped plant evolution elsewhere. The structural strangeness of Australian plants is not random. It is the accumulated result of tens of millions of years of solving problems that no other flora on earth has had to solve in the same way.
5. Blue lechenaultia (Lechenaultia biloba)
Blue lechenaultia produces a saturated, vivid blue that is genuinely rare in nature. But the colour is not even the most unusual thing about it. Each individual flower has five petals split into two distinct fan-shaped lobes, creating a bilateral symmetry. The two-lobed structure is a pollination adaptation: native bees land on the lower lobe and are guided by the architecture of the upper lobe directly to the pollen and nectar. It grows on the sandy coastal plains and heathlands of southwestern WA, where it forms a low, spreading mound.
Planting tip
Plant in full sun in very free-draining sandy or gravelly soil — waterlogging at any point is fatal. It suits raised beds, rock gardens and the tops of retaining walls where drainage is excellent. A hori hori is useful for preparing planting pockets in rocky or gravelly positions without disturbing the surrounding soil profile. Keep fertilisers away from the root zone.
6. Mountain devil (Lambertia formosa)
Mountain devil is named for its seed pods, not its flowers. Each pod is a woody capsule with two curved horns projecting from its tip, creating an unmistakable devil-head silhouette that persists on the plant for years. The red tubular flowers are honeyeater-adapted, with a structure that deposits pollen on the bird's head as it probes for nectar. It grows on the sandstone heathlands of coastal NSW, where the hard woody pods protect the seeds from fire — they open only after the heat of a bushfire passes over them.
Planting tip
Plant in full sun in sandy, free-draining soil low in nutrients. It is one of the most reliable flowering shrubs for Sydney basin gardens on sandy or sandstone soils. Use sharp secateurs to remove spent flowering stems and encourage new growth. It does not suit heavy clay or high-phosphorus fertilisers.
7. Pine-leaved geebung (Persoonia pinifolia)
Pine-leaved geebung produces small yellow flowers from the axils of pine-like needle leaves all along every stem simultaneously. The flowers are followed by small green to purple drupes — the geebungs of the common name — that are edible. The needle foliage gives the plant a soft, conifer-like texture. It belongs to the Proteaceae family but shares almost none of the visual characteristics of its relatives.
Planting tip
Plant in free-draining, acidic sandy soil in full sun. It can be slow to establish and resents root disturbance — plant from a container into its final position using a hori hori to open the planting hole cleanly without tearing surrounding roots. Water consistently through the first two summers. Keep phosphorus fertilisers away from the root zone.
8. Coppercups (Pileanthus peduncularis)
The flowers of coppercups are small cupped goblets in vivid copper-orange. The cup shape is created by five concave petals held together at their bases, forming a structure that channels insect pollinators directly to the central stamens. It grows on the sandplains of southwestern WA in low heath communities. Outside WA it is almost impossible to find in nurseries, which makes growing it from seed or sourcing it from a specialist WA native nursery one of the more rewarding plant hunts available.
Dinkum, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
Planting tip
Plant in full sun in very free-draining sandy soil. It does not tolerate clay, waterlogging or high-phosphorus fertilisers. Best suited to Mediterranean-climate gardens in WA and SA. Use fine hedge shears to lightly trim after flowering and maintain a compact mounded form.
9. Garland lily (Calostemma purpureum)
Garland lily has clusters of pink to purple trumpet flowers that grow from completely bare ground, with no foliage present at all. The leaves appear later, after flowering has finished, and then die back completely. This strategy, known as hysteranthy, allows the plant to flower at a precise moment triggered by summer rainfall in its dry inland habitat.
androo857, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Planting tip
Plant bulbs in free-draining soil in full sun with the neck at or just below the soil surface, using a hori hori to set the depth precisely. Water sparingly through the dormant period and increase watering in late summer to trigger flowering. It performs well in pots where the dry dormant period can be managed easily. Do not disturb the bulbs during dormancy.
10. Blue pincushion (Brunonia australis)
Blue pincushion produces perfect spherical heads of small blue flowers on slender stems above a rosette of soft basal leaves. Each head contains dozens of individual flowers packed together. The vivid blue colour is unusual in the Australian flora outside WA. It is one of the most widely distributed plants on this list, occurring across all states in temperate grassland and grassy woodland.
Planting tip
Plant in free-draining soil in full sun. It suits the front of a native border, gravel gardens or naturalised grassland plantings where its low rosette form reads well at ground level. Divide congested clumps every two to three years in autumn using a hand fork to reinvigorate flowering. It tolerates moderate drought and light frost.
11. Albany catspaw (Adenanthos detmoldii)
Albany catspaw produces tubular red flowers with styles that protrude well beyond the floral tube and curve upward at the tip. The flowers are produced over a long season and are highly attractive to honeyeaters, which hover at the blooms and collect pollen on their foreheads as they probe for nectar. The soft, silky foliage is covered in fine hairs. It is restricted to the coastal heathlands around Albany in southwestern WA, making it one of the more geographically restricted plants on this list.
Planting tip
Plant in full sun in free-draining sandy or gravelly soil. It suits Mediterranean-climate gardens in WA and SA and tolerates coastal exposure. Prune lightly after the main flowering period with bypass secateurs to maintain a compact form and encourage new flowering growth. Keep standard fertilisers away from the root zone.
12. Red penda (Xanthostemon youngii)
When red penda is in full flower, the entire canopy erupts in a dense mass of long red stamens that obscure the leaves almost entirely, creating the impression of a tree on fire. It grows naturally along the margins of tropical rainforest in far north QLD, where it flowers through the dry season, providing a critical nectar source for honeyeaters and sunbirds when little else is available.
Planting tip
Plant in full sun to part shade in free-draining, moderately fertile soil in a frost-free position. It establishes quickly and begins flowering at a relatively young age. Water consistently through the first two summers — ollas buried beside the root zone reduce the need for surface irrigation during establishment. Use bypass loppers to manage any crossing branches in the early years and establish a good canopy structure.
A flora unlike any other
Every strange structure — the flowers from phyllode margins, the devil-horned pods, the bare-ground trumpets, the staminal inferno of the red penda — is the result of a specific evolutionary pressure that the Australian environment applied over millions of years. Understanding why a plant looks the way it does tells you exactly what the plant needs to thrive and what it will do in your garden if you give it the right conditions.
Most of the plants on this list are findable at specialist native nurseries, though some — particularly the coppercups, Albany catspaw and garland lily — may require some searching. The effort is worth it.
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A Guide to Australian Native Gardening
How to plan, plant and care for a thriving native garden, whatever your experience level.
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