Botanical Art Gallery

713. View of Lake Wakatipe, New Zealand

New Zealand Flax (Phormniumn tenax, Forst.) in the foreground. This is the most useful plant in the islands. Half-a-pint of honey juice can be obtained from the flowers of a single plant ; a gum is exuded where the leaves are broken away from the ste

© RBG KEW

713, Art, Lake Wakatipe, Landscape, Marianne North, New Zealand, Painting, Phormium Tenax, Victorian

47. Flowers of Datura and Humming Birds, Brazil

Datura arborea, Linn., is a native of tropical America, and is commonly cultivated in other countries, as it grows like a rank weed. It is better known in English greenhouses under the name Brugmansia arborea, Pers. See 132, 227, and 689 The leaves a

© RBG KEW

Art, Artist, Brazil, Flower, Leaves, Marianne North, Painting, Water, Weed

No. 767. Study of the Bunya-Bunya

Oil on board, no date. Study of the Bunya-Bunya. This noble Conifer, Araucaria Bidwillii, Hook., is perhaps the most valuable food-tree indigenous in Australia, and only grows on one semi-circle of hills, within 100 miles in stretch, between the Brisbane and Burnett rivers, Queensland. The larger of the older trees are nearly 200 feet high, with a circumference of trunk of about twenty-five feet; and the horizontal markings on the pillar-like trunks make them very conspicuous amongst other trees. But what is most remarkable about these trees is that they are the only hereditary property any of the aborigines are known to possess. Each tribe has its own group of trees, and each family a certain tree or trees; and any interference with these rights leads to a bloody fight. The larger cones are a foot long and nine inches in diameter; and they are full of edible nuts (seeds) as large as chestnuts. Every third year there is an extra large crop, when the natives assemble from all parts to collect it. By an act of the Colonial Government the Bunya-Bunya is strictly preserved for the use and sustenance of the aborigines. Look at 713, 771, 773'. [Entry from the Official Guide to the North Gallery'. Fifth Edition, 1892]

© RBG KEW