Austral Grass Tree, Kangaroo Tails at Deua, NSW
Identification history
| Unidentified | 7 Oct 2019 | Jubeyjubes |
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5 comments
JackieMiles
wrote:
9 Oct 2019
I've made a bit of an assumption that this is X. australis, even though I see the elevation is 1000m. On the tablelands X. glauca is more common (they are the two species with a sizeable trunk in southern NSW). Grass trees are very hard to identify even when you have leaves and flowers in the hand.
Jubeyjubes
wrote:
9 Oct 2019
This was one of thousands, located on the western end of the Merricumbene Fire Trail, some of them clearly tall and old - this one was 2 m at least. Don't know if you want to make this comment private, in order to protect them. These grass trees seemed to disappear at lower levels and appear when the road wound back through the tops. Good to know they are hard to ID to species level - I couldn't see any distinguishing features when I looked up close.
JackieMiles
wrote:
9 Oct 2019
I doubt anyone's going to slog out there to remove them. I presume it would take a backhoe to do it. They do tend to occur in numbers like that, particularly in rocky spots. The fact that there is lots there shows there is no Phytophthora (Cinnamon fungus) present. It is a root rot fungus that kills susceptible plants, particularly grass trees, and is usually introduced via mud on vehicles. I presume Merricumbene FT doesn't get a lot of traffic.
Jubeyjubes
wrote:
9 Oct 2019
Yeah, with good range in ages (from tiny babies through to clearly ancient specimens). I suspect the road would get maybe 50 vehicles per year - we saw two groups of 5 each and this is, from experience, I think one of the busiest weekends in the year up there. Technical and challenging driving that would be almost impassable in the wrong conditions. Spectacular for the nature lover.
JackieMiles
wrote:
9 Oct 2019
Yeah, in fact the last time I tried Merricumbene FT, it did turn out to be impassable; we got on the wrong side of a steep pinch we couldn't get back up and it took us till 5am the next day to get home. Never again! But yep, some good veg along there, including a few rhyolite outcrops with some interesting plants (but they are off to the side, so you probably need to know where they are to find them).
Location information
- Maps Deua National Park
- Places Deua, NSW
Sighting information
- 16 - 100 Abundance
- 7 Oct 2019 10:18 AM Recorded on
- Jubeyjubes Recorded by
Species information
- Xanthorrhoea australis Scientific name
- Austral Grass Tree, Kangaroo Tails Common name
- Sensitive
- Local native
- Non-Invasive
- Machine learning
-
In flower
- External link More information
