Vaughan’s Native Nursery

There are hundreds of sensational Australian native plants available to home gardeners these days, so it’s not surprising that they’re undergoing a whole new wave of popularity. Natives first rose to prominence through the 1960s and 70s, but quite a few of the varieties sold then were difficult to grow and often tended to drop dead. Now there are improved varieties of many of the plants that were once so hard to grow. Grafting delicate plants onto strong, robust rootstocks has also made a tremendous difference.

The bad news is that some of these new, improved varieties are still a little difficult to find. Don visited Vaughan’s Australian Plants at Curlewis in Victoria, which has one of the best collections of new varieties of Australian plants anywhere in the country. The owner, Phillip Vaughan, used to run Mt Cassell Native Nursery in Pomonal. Phillip thinks there’s a real role for Australian plants, particularly during the drought, because planted in the right sort of location they’ll survive well in dry conditions.

The garden display at the nursery features a huge selection of grevilleas, which were in full flower at the time of our visit. Grevilleas are the most popular Australian native plants, because they are versatile, long flowering and they attract native birds. Don pointed out many other colourful natives, including clear yellow phebaliums (Phebalium stenophyllum), beautiful blue lechenaultias (Lechenaultia biloba), everlasting daisies (Rhodanthe chlorocephala), darwinias (named after Erasmus Darwin, the grandfather of Charles), pimelias, chorizemas (Chorizema cordatum, C. aciculare) and a selected form of native hibiscus (Alyogyne huegelii ‘West Coast Gem’).

Further information

Our segment was filmed at Vaughan’s Australian Plants, 1060 Portarlington Road, Curlewis, Victoria. Phone: (03) 5250 5592.

Other specialist Australian native plant nurseries include:

NSW/VIC

Annangrove Grevilleas Native Nursery, Kenthurst
Phone: (02) 9654 1380

Cranebrook Native Nursery, Cranebrook
Phone: (02) 4777 4256

Sydney Wildflower Nursery West, Marsden Park
Phone: (02) 9628 4448

Sydney Wildflower Nursery South, Heathcote
Phone: (02) 9548 2818

Palm Land & Sydney Wildflower Nursery, Terrey Hills
Phone: (02) 9450 1555

The Wildflower Place, Erina Heights
Phone (02) 4365 5510
Fax: (02) 4365 5514

Kuranga Native Nursery
Ringwood
Phone: (03) 9879 4076

Mt Cassell Native Nursery
Pomonal
Phone: (03) 5356 6351

QLD / SA

Fairhill Native Plants
Yandina
Phone: (07) 5446 7088

Nielsen’s Native Nursery
Loganholme
Phone: (07) 3806 1414

Nellie Nursery, Mannum
Phone: (08) 8569 1762

WA

Zanthorrea Nursery
Maida Vale
Phone: (08) 9454 6260