Plants

Australia is home to more than 25,000 native plant species, and the vast majority occur nowhere else on the planet, a direct result of millions of years spent evolving in isolation to cope with nutrient-poor soil, unpredictable rainfall, and genuinely fierce sun and heat. That evolutionary history is exactly why so many Australian natives make … Read more

Hop bush is a tough, adaptable evergreen shrub with one of the most genuinely remarkable distribution stories of any plant in cultivation, a species that spread across 6 continents entirely on its own, without any help from human cultivation, over roughly the last 2 million years. Its colorful, papery seed capsules and willingness to thrive … Read more

Photinia × fraseri became one of the most widely planted hedge shrubs across the American South almost entirely because of a single, specific visual trait: brilliant red new growth that flushes across the entire plant several times a year before fading to a deep, glossy green. For decades, that dramatic seasonal color made it the … Read more

Westringia fruticosa is one of the toughest, most reliably low-maintenance shrubs an Australian or Mediterranean-climate gardener can plant, a dense, silvery-green evergreen that shrugs off salt spray, relentless coastal wind, and drought with equal indifference. Its common name, coast rosemary, points directly at the reason for its popularity: a passing resemblance to true rosemary that’s … Read more

Tea Tree (Leptospermum spp.): The Plant Behind Manuka Honey Tea tree is the common name for roughly 90 species in the genus Leptospermum, a group of small-leaved, spiky, evergreen shrubs and small trees almost entirely native to Australia, with a handful of species also found in New Zealand and parts of Southeast Asia. The name … Read more

Cherries belong to Prunus subgenus Cerasus, a specific branch of the same genus that also gives us peaches, plums, apricots, and almonds, all grouped together within the rose family. True cherries are generally split into 2 main types: sweet cherries, descended largely from Prunus avium, and sour or tart cherries, descended from Prunus cerasus, with … Read more

Kangaroo Paw: The Australian Native Plant Kangaroo paw is one of the most instantly recognizable wildflowers in Australia, its tubular, velvet-coated blooms splitting open into curved claw-like fingers that genuinely resemble a small marsupial’s paw reaching up from the stem. Few flowers anywhere commit so completely to their common name, and fewer still manage to … Read more

Oregano is the common name for plants in the genus Origanum, a group of aromatic perennial herbs and subshrubs in the mint family native almost entirely to the Mediterranean region and western Asia. Depending on which taxonomic study is consulted, the genus contains somewhere between 38 and 45 recognized species, along with several subspecies and … Read more

Oregano is the common name for plants in the genus Origanum, a group of aromatic perennial herbs and subshrubs in the mint family native almost entirely to the Mediterranean region and western Asia. Depending on which taxonomic study is consulted, the genus contains somewhere between 38 and 45 recognized species, along with several subspecies, botanical … Read more

Dill, botanically Anethum graveolens, is an aromatic annual herb in the parsley family, believed to have originated somewhere across the Mediterranean, southern Russia, and central and southern Asia before becoming one of the most widely cultivated culinary herbs on Earth. It’s genuinely the sole species in its own genus, Anethum, a relatively unusual botanical status … Read more