Plants for all-year flowers
Say hello to Native Coleus, a hardy plant that producing numerous purple spires of flowers that appeal to bees and other insects, such as hover flies
I spend a lot of time encouraging people to 'grow local': to plant the plants that have evolved in this region over millions of years.
This work is all about supporting the ongoing relationships between the plants and the animals that depend on each other to survive. Part of that work is identifying local plants that will 'do the same job' as not-so-local plants. And one question that often comes up is: which plants can provide year-round flowers to add colour and interest to a garden, and provide resources for native bees at a time when few plants are flowering.
This post is dedicated to some of the local plants that flower all year. And first and foremost is the Native Coleus (Coleus graveolens), a soft sub-shrub or large herb in the Lamiaceae family – same as mint and basil. An exceptionally hardy plant, it flowers for much of the year, producing numerous purple spires of flowers that appeal to a wide range of bees and other insects, such as hover flies.
Native Coleus is uncommon in the Illawarra region, and is mostly found in the southern portion, in exposed situations on rocky soil, where it copes with dry conditions and full sun. If you'd like to see it in person, there's good plantings of it at Wollongong Botanic Garden, just outside the administration building.
A related plant, Cockspur Flower (Coleus australis, formerly Plectranthus parviflorus) also occurs in the region, and also flowers all year round. It is an incredible attractor of native pollinators.
Good places to see Cockspur Flower are at Puckey's Estate, where it grows along the path that runs south from the surf club, and at Wollongong Botanic Garden, where it appears throughout the dryland garden area. Cockspur Flower is in flower right now.
I do hesitate to recommend Cockspur Flower as a garden plant, as it can grow very quickly and dominate an area that you might like to keep more diverse. But it is just so good for native pollinators, you might accept its enthusiastic growth.
Other all-year flowerers include the Love Creepers (Glycine species), small and delicate twining plants that find their way up and around other plants in woodlands and forests. Our region is home to three different Love Creeper species, and they all flower for much of the year, attracting a wide range of insect pollinators and seed-eating birds once the fruit appear.
I can't recommend a particular place to view Love Creeper, unfortunately, as it is rarely a featured plant in parks or gardens.
But if you wander through almost any local reserve you're likely to see it, with its purple-pink flowers and its leaves made up of three long leaflets. And there are several verges in Mount Pleasant that host Love Creeper.
While none of these plants offers the easy, bright colour of garden-shop Lobelias or Alyssums, they are much more in tune with the needs of local animals (from birds to bees and bats and mammals). Watch them grow in a patch near you, and see what animals come out to interact with them.
About the writer
Emma Rooksby is a volunteer bush regenerator and environmental educator who helped establish the Growing Illawarra Natives website. She is passionate about protecting and restoring biodiversity in the Illawarra.
