Sex and Death

I think its testament to how much there is to see in the gardens that it has been a year before I have posted about the glasshouse.  Since October last year there has been an exhibition on 'Sex and Death' - a fascinating collection of orchids and carnivorous plants, both exotic and native.  I took these pictures a few weeks ago, so I'm not sure if these flowers will still be there.  I was disappointed I had missed seeing Grammatophyllum papuanum in flower - the world's largest orchid, which occupies a whole corner of the glasshouse.  The plant was collected from Papua New Guinea in the 1980s and it is a very tricky plant to keep in cultivation, so the botanic garden was thrilled when it flowered twice in recent years.
The glasshouse has a lot of plants and facts crammed into its modest space, including some interesting facts about the humble Banana Musa paradisiaca, translated from the original arabic name 'Tree of Paradise'!  Bananas are in fact giant herbs that grow from underground rhizomes.  There are more than 100 varieties of banana grown around the world, in Australia there are 4 native species M.  paradisiaca, M. banksii, M. fitzalanii and M. hillii.  

I also learnt that some plants, including most orchids, are potentially immortal!  Although flowers, leaves, stems and roots will die of old age, the plant will keep on growing unless killed by disease, accident or are eaten.

Another interesting fact is that not all carnivorous plants are carnivorous, some are vegetarian!  Nepenthes ampullaria is one such vegetarian found in lowland SE Asian and New Guinea, which catches leaves and debris in its open pitcher on the forest floor.  There were plenty of the carnivorous variety in the glasshouse too though, including this Venus flytrap dionaea muscipula and carnivorous pitcher plant:

The Dragons are back - but no sign of the Gang-gangs

On Wednesday the garden was full of Gang-gang cockatoos Callocephalon fimbriatum - I could hear them everywhere and saw about 10 of them.  I even saw a pair doing a sort of mating dance, where they gave each other little pecks.  Of course, when I went back on Friday with my camera there wasn't one to be seen, so I still haven't got a picture of one for my blog!  They seemed to have been replaced by Crimson Rosellas - and love was in the air for these too.  The Pryor tree has a pair nesting in a hole, I got a very cute picture of one peeking out, I thought I saw a little one beside her too at one point, but I might have imagined it!

To make up for the lack of Gang-gangs I was pleased to find plenty of Water Dragons back in the gardens, the last time I saw one to take a picture of for this blog was for my second blog post, back in March! I saw a small one too - it looks like its a baby dragon. 

 After seeing so many Waratahs last weekend at Mount Tomah I remembered the picture I took earlier in the year (April) of a Braidwood Waratah seedpod (Telopea mongaensis).  I found the plant again and it was bursting into bloom, some seedpods are still clinging on though you can just see in the first picture. 

 I found a couple more pretty flowers I'd not seen before too, a beautiful Orchid Telychiton tarberi at the entrance to the Rainforest, which is an epiphyte (attaches itself to the trunk of trees).  This appears to be referred to commonly as 'king orchid' which I can see why, its quite spectacular. 

I also found this beautiful purple flower in the Grevillea/Hakea section, it looks more like a Hakea to me but I couldn't find a label on it.