Signs of summer

We don’t get pohutukawa trees this far south but one of the harbingers of summer is the blooming of the cabbage trees.

They’ve been particularly exuberant this year.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 28th, 2010 at 11:00 am and is filed under nature. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

5 Responses to Signs of summer

  1. gravedodger's avatar gravedodger says:
    28/12/2010 at 11:57 am

    legends from my past suggest that a big display of flowering on Cordyline Australis is a prediction of a hot dry summer. The cynic in me believes that the prolific flowering is more likely to follow a wet winter and the hot dry summer is the result of averaging of weather outcomes, that we have had over the recent year.
    We have certainly seen some grand displays of blooms on cabbage trees lately but disturbingly there is still evedence of the devastating disease that killed so many, in particular lone trees, in the latter years of last century.
    All that said we have had in excess of 30 mls(est) here at Ealing on the north bank of the Rangitata in the last 18 hours, very welcome where the irrigators don’t reach.

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  2. robertguyton's avatar robertguyton says:
    28/12/2010 at 12:02 pm

    With all that flowering that goes on every other summer, you’d expect cordylines to be everywhere but they’re not.
    I wonder why that is?
    I’ve about 40 here in my garden.

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  3. gravedodger's avatar gravedodger says:
    28/12/2010 at 2:04 pm

    I have established many in the several places I have resided but never anywhere near where I choose to mow as the fallen leaves are hell on mower bearings and oil seals. That’s possibly why local body recycling for compost often refuse to accept them in garden waste along with native flaxes. ie machinery damage.

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  4. robertguyton's avatar robertguyton says:
    28/12/2010 at 3:17 pm

    They are great as kindling – knotted and dried – can’t beat ’em for firestarters.
    I don’t mow and have no problem with them – in fact, I would like to see more and more ti kouka, everywhere!
    Birds eat the berries with great gusto and distribute the seeds near and far but few grow. I wonder why.
    Sown into potting mix, they come up like a lawn.

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  5. JC's avatar JC says:
    28/12/2010 at 4:44 pm

    “but never anywhere near where I choose to mow as the fallen leaves are hell on mower bearings and oil seals.”

    Tell me about it..

    I’m sure they could be marketed as hawsers for supertankers.

    JC

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