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Plants that grow well at Crystal Brook
Perhaps I'm a lazy gardener, but I don't see much point in working hard to
grow plants that are not easy to grow or are not well suited to the local
conditions; so here is a list of some that my wife and I have found do
well at Crystal Brook.
The soil at Crystal Brook is alkaline sandy loam inclined to be
water-repellent if it becomes completely dry.
Apart from the plants that are imaged and discussed below (and are listed
on the left and in the index, some that grow
readily at Crystal Brook are...
- Fruit and nut trees
- Citrus do very well with a moderate amount of water (it's hard to
give away lemons in Crystal Brook), almond, stone-fruit (other than cherry),
quandong; it's too hot for apples and pears, and avocardos can't handle the
dry heat.
There are some walnut trees in town, but with increasing tempertures due to
climate change, I wouldn't recommend
them.
- Other trees
- There are a huge number: among the natives, many Acacia (wattles),
Brachychiton (kurrajong, Illawarra flame tree), Callistemon
(bottle-brush), Callitris (native cypress-pines), Casuarina
(she-oaks), Dodonaea (hop-bushes), Eucalypt (gum trees),
Mellalueca (paper-barks and teatrees)
and Pittosporum (native apricot).
I know little about growing introduced trees, but a number of pines do
well, palms, Jacaranda; it's too hot and dry for oak.
- Shrubs
- Natives include:
Correa (seem to struggle due to the heat and dryness at CB)
Eremophila (emu-bush), Gossypium sturtii
(Sturt's desert rose)
Non-natives: Lavender, Pelargonium (geranium), Salvia and
Senna
- Ground-covers, climbers
- Natives: Creeping boobiala, Kennedia species (coral peas,
creeping postman)
Non-natives: Pashionfruit,
- Ornamentals
- Agapanthus, Chrysanthemum, Iris, Jasmine,
jonquils, roses (I'm not
much interested in growing flowers).
- Vegetables
- Sweet potatoes, beans (climbing in summer, broad in winter),
onions, peas, silver beet, tomatoes; sweet corn and potatoes grow well,
but use so much water as to not to be worth-while.
- Herbs
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Chives, garlic chives, mint, oregano, parsley, rosemary, sage and
thyme grow easily.
This page created 2010/02/17
Contact: email daveclarkecb@yahoo.com
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I've tried to follow botanical convention; botanical names are usually
shown in italics with the generic names
capitalised and specific names in lower case.
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Also see
Growing Trees and
smaller plants at Clare.
Clare differs from Crystal Brook in having a wetter climate and acidic soil.
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This is a work in progress |
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Grapes, which can also be used as ornamental plants,
are elsewhere on this page.
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| | Virginia creeper
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Virginia creeper is a very hardy plant that will provide shade in summer,
when it is sorely needed in the increasingly hot Crystal Brook climate,
and let the sun in in winter.
The botanical name is Parthenocissus quinquefolia and the plant
originated from North America.
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| | Ruby saltbush
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Botanical name Enchilina tomentosa, this small Australian native
shrub is very easy to grow from seed, keeps green all year round with
little water, and has attractive tiny,
edible (bush tucker) red and purple berries in season (not in the photo).
It will reproduce from its own seed, but is easy to control by pulling out,
or hoeing out, unwanted plants.
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| | Bougainvillea
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This is a small variegated plant in a pot; there are many large
bougainvillea (Bougainvillea species) plants growing in the ground
around Crystal Brook.
They are great for flowers, not so good if you don't like spines.
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| | Heartleaf iceplant
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Mile-a-minute is the local name, but is seems a more widely used common
name for this easy-to-grow succulent ground-cover is hearleaf iceplant.
Its botanical name is Aptenia cordifolia.
It requires little water, will handle exposure to full sun, and is (at
lease in a back-yard situation) easy to control.
It provides a nice carpet of green right through the summer.
It will not handle being walked on, and it goes dormant in winter when
weeds can grow over the top of it (particularly soursob).
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| | Chinese jade
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This succulent grows very well in Crystal Brook, and will easily survive
the hot, dry, summers with little watering, providing welcome green
foliage in the garden.
It needs very little attention, except to cut it back periodically.
In a very hot period it will produce occasional flowers.
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| | Chives, garlic chives, oregano, rosemary, sage, thyme
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In addition to the herbs on the right mint and parsley grows well
(the photo was taken in summer, the wrong time of the year for parsley).
As mentioned elsewhere on this page, citrus trees and stone fruit (other
than cherries) do very well in Crystal Brook.
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| | Grapes
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The table grape vines (Vitis vinifera) on the trellis in the
illustration have taken about
six years to reach their current stage of growth.
There are seven varieties.
Both table grapes and wine grapes do very well at Crystal Brook.
Many Australian native plants, including several Acacia, Allocasuarina,
Callistemon, Callitris, Casuarina, Dodonaea, Pittosporum
and Senna species do very well at Crystal Brook.
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| | Eucalypt
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Too many Eucalypts (Eucalyptus species) to name, including many
decorative Western Australian species, will grow very well at Crystal Brook.
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| | Yacca
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Yaccas (as they are known in South Australia, also grass trees or
black-boys), Xanthorrhoea quadrangulata are native to the region and
grow well in Crystal Brook.
They grow slowly anywhere, the specimen in the photo is about ten years
old.
While mature plants can be bought from nurseries, I've heard that they
commonly die after a few months or up to a year.
They can be propagated by seed, either into a tube or direct into the
soil where they are to grow.
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| | Chilli
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| | Capsicum
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Chillies and capsicums grow very well at Crystal Brook.
Both will live for several years, producing during the summer.
Chillies seem to handle the heat better than capsicums, which need light
shade in the hottest afternoons; the leaves survive, but the fruit
burns.
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| | Egg-plant
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Convolvulus species.
They handle the heat well (better than capsicums do).
Grubs get into the fruit unless the plant is sprayed with something like
Success (a preparation based on bacteria or bacterial toxins that are
specific to grubs and catapillars).
They need a moderate amount of water.
Egg-plants are Solanum species, possibly Solanum melongena.
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Potatoes and sweet corn grow well, but require too much water to be a
practicality.
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| | Rhubarb
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Grows well in Crystal Brook, but does best under light shade, at least in
the hottest weather, and requires a fair bit of water.
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| | Sweet potato
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I first planted some cuttings in mid-summer 2007; it would have been
much better to have planted them in spring (after the risk of frosts has
finished), but a neighbour gave me some in summer.
I am very impressed at how easy they are to grow; exceptionally easy to
plant from cuttings and easy to keep growing. They seem to need little
water in summer and do not suffer much from insects.
There was some damage from slugs or snails, but the plants grew so quickly
that they seemed to out-grow the predators.
Unlike in cooler, wetter, areas, such as Clare, sweet potato tubers survive
the winter in the ground quite well in Crystal Brook.
While the above-ground part of the plant will die back in the winter, the
tuber will shoot in the spring.
They seem to survive winter best against a north-facing wall.
As climate change makes frosts rarer
and winters milder in Crystal Brook sweet
potatoes will quite probably retain some leaves over winter.
Wikipedia's article on
sweet potato, under
'Cultivation', states that annual rainfalls of 750-1000mm, with a minimum of
500mm in the growing season, are best suited for sweet potatoes.
Crystal Brook has an average annual rainfall of around 400mm with no reliable
rainfall in the sweet potato growing season.
I have found that they grow well using a moderate amount of irrigation
by dripper.
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Tomatoes grow well, but often die from virus or fungus before fruiting.
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