Rowena Scott, Writer

Walk to see flowers

We weren’t walking specially to see flowers but the majesty and abundance of Australian wildflowers stopped us often. Wanting to photograph every single shrub and from several angles, we weren’t much interested in identification. Nomenclature didn’t matter. Yes, it was a parrot-pea, genus Dillwynia or Eutaxia or Pultenaea, several genera of the family Fabaceae, but it was the sparkle on the golden petals shining in sunlight that attracted us closer. The tiny splash of reddish-brown, curved like bacon. “Bacon and egg plant,” a friend called. We couldn’t avoid the name after all. Some red rather than brown, like egg and tomato sauce. The leaves are small and narrow, a little spikey. Thankfully several bushes were adjacent to the track so we weren’t enticed to crash through the vulnerable native bush. We’d all seen a variety of parrot-pea flowers of many species endemic to different parts of Australia, all stunning, yet we lingered to appreciate these tiny yellow beauties and talked of growing an indigenous species in our own gardens.