Mitiamo trip

Hello, I am going nuts with my camera at the moment. I have so many pictures to sort through and upload! In the meantime here's a few more images from the Mitiamo trip. Up above is a native and local pine tree variety. It's broken through a huge slab of ancient volcano granite and is a white pine. The Mt Terrick Terrick area was reserved originally for these trees-they are resistant to termites so this area was being preserved for timber. Fortunately for all the wedge tailed eagles, black wallabies and other beautiful locals it has all been protected as a national park now.

Something I find interesting is how the soil, the classic orange-red outback ground, looks dry and dusty, despite the huge amounts of rain this area has recently received, in fact on the way there and back lots of the side roads are still impassable, with water right over them.

The ground supports a lot of life though and as the rains fell out come these lovely wildflowers and wallaby grass. The star shaped very pale purple flowers are Wahlenbergia stricta.

The yellow flowers are a kind of daisy-the petals are tough and hard like paper and are so called 'everlasting daisies'

These clumping purple isotoma axillaris flowers are very prolific, growing around the granite rocks- they were so sweet, looking more like a cottage garden plant than a native flower.

Some of my family lived in this area a hundred odd years ago, maybe these flowers were appreciated by my old relatives, perhaps even placed on a grave?

One of the best places to see wildflowers in Australia is around old cemeteries. When mourners gathered wildflowers, and left them on the graves, they self seeded and have continued to reproduce each year( as they are relatively undisturbed and rarely cleared special grounds.)

So while it may seem morbid I love and recommend if you are ever in Victoria to go visiting old cemeteries!

xKate