I set aside a morning to visit the Zanthorrea Nursery when I was in Western Australia last August. This was a much anticipated adventure as I have heard much about the nursery and often have recommended it to Western Australians looking for native plants.
I was not disappointed, it is a wonderful place, full of great ideas and extremely well organised, the thing I appreciated most was the display gardens.

The nursery has a dedicated staff member in charge of the display gardens, ensuring that there is always new plantings and something fresh to appreciate.

The gardens have different sections where you can see how versatile native plants really are, in the image above you can see part of the ‘formal native’ garden.

 

One of the plants used in a formal fashion that I would never have thought of was Austromyrtus dulcis, doesn’t it make lovely mounds?

 

I also loved the way this Baeckea virgata Dwarf has been pruned into pom poms, almost like topiary.

 

The gardens are filled with art and sculpture, each piece located thoughtfully and often for sale.

 

Unfortuneatly the water feature was fenced off with a regulation pool fence, but I really adored the Themeda ‘Mingo’ running alongside the water and the Lomandra ‘Tanika’ spouting up i the foreground.

 

Oh and the playground! I had 3 little people with me so was so thankful for such an inspired play-space! So rarely done well in nurseries and so very important, my kids entertained themselves for 2 and 1/2 hours here 😉

 

And the really cool chook pen!

 

In the image above you can see an example of a really beautiful planting, paper daisies in the foreground, Correa alba on the right and Grass trees in the rear.

 

There were lots of wonderful examples of this plant Acacia howittii ‘Honey Bun’,  it must be someones favourite….grows so well i part shade.

 

And can sometimes get quite large and be under-pruned into a stunning small tree!

 

Or can just be left alone to fill a shady corner, OK its one of my favourites too 😉

 

Another standout plant in their shady garden area was Phebalium squamulosum, this does very well here on the East coast too, thriving in dry shade.

 

 

Every plant in the garden has a clear name tag, which was repeated whenever the plant was repeated, just like a botanic garden.

 

The nursery itself is also very beautiful, the displays are fresh and incorporate mixed plants and other items you use in a garden.

 

Aren’t these logs with fungus amazing? There is also an information hut in the centre of the nursery which is jam packed with everything you need to know about gardening with native plants.

 

Plus a whats on board.

 

Looks like there is always something going on here. However I veer off track, back to the display gardens!

 

In the image above you can see Banksia ‘Stumpy Gold’, good to see they grow in WA too.

 

Banksia ‘Stumpy Gold’ flower, above.

 

And Banksia ‘Birthday Candles’, the reason I am posting these images is that I really want more photos on the internet of the different Banksia spinulosa Dwarf varieties available out there! And these were two very good mature examples.

 

Anigozanthos ‘Bush Pearl’ seems to grow very happily in Western Australia too. Below is Hibbertia dentata, now that is a plant I wouldn’t have expected to see out west!

I will leave it at that, of course I have many more photos taken in the beautiful grounds of the nursery, but I shall save them for a later date.

Thanks Zanthorrea for being so inspiring!