Wildflower Season in Western Australia

Wildflower Season in Western Australia

Everybody has been telling us that this is the best wildflower season in WA since 1994, the principal reason being the widespread rains throughout winter. The wheat growing areas also seem to be having a huge year. Vast hectares of canola are also brightening up the countryside with huge swathes of bright yellow set off against the wheat and other crops.

We travelled from Geraldton to Mullewa in our first foray into wildflower country. The Mullewa Wildflower Festival was on in the town hall.  The hall had been lavishly decorated with cut wildflowers including (incredibly) a couple of dug up wreath flowers. Even though the display was supposed to last for a week, the flowers were already beginning to look a little limp on the second day. The variety on display was excellent, with many native orchids I was seeing in the flesh for the first time. Were really impressed by the wreath flowers and decided to track down some specimens in the wild at the earliest opportunity.

That opportunity was to arise a couple of days later when we moved to Morowa, just a little further down the road. The really helpful and enthusiastic lady volunteer in the tourist information centre was armed with maps of reported sightings of wreath flowers and the location of the best wildflower displays including a variety of native orchids, so off we went.

The wreath flower (Lechenaultia macrantha) is not exactly rare, but is probably best described as uncommon. Its range is confined to a relatively small area from Shark Bay to Mullewa, Paynes Find and Murchison. The flowers like to grow in woodland areas particularly in disturbed soil, so they are often found after grading and clearing, on roadsides, along railway lines and especially in gravel pits.

We travelled about 40 Km out of town to a reported sighting and we were not disappointed.  At this roadside location there were between 30 and 40 wreath flowers, nearly all in full bloom, some up to 40 cm across, an outstanding display.

The locals around Morawa are very proud of the fact that the wreath flowers grow in their area. I was driving slowly along the shoulder of the road looking for the flowers when I was passed by a local driving at speed. He disappeared around a bend and then turned around and came back and gave me the correct location that turned out to be just a bit further up the road – very friendly, helpful folk!

Having photographed the wreath flowers from just about every angle and stood and looked at them for quite a long time we reluctantly moved on to find Canna, a location with an outstanding display of many types of native orchids. I have seen pictures in my various orchid books of many of these specimens and here they were in abundance. I could write a blog on orchids alone. I will include just a small number in the pictures in this blog.

NEXT BLOG, MORE WILDFLOWERS