Wild BNE

Rains bring mercy for some, but not others. Warning: Graphic image may cause distress Native Sarsaparilla, Ormiston August is often a fairly dry month for Brisbane, but the clouds have paid no attention to the calendar in recent weeks. Heavy, soaking rains have settled in over successive weekends, reviving lowland catchment areas and showing mercy upon previously parched plant life.  Before the rains hit, I undertook a plant survey along Hilliards Creek, in the Redlands. Longtime 'Wild BNE' fans may remember a post I made last year about the  fish of this waterway , and once again, it was a beautiful place to spend time in. On this occasion, I was pleased to become acquainted with Weeping Figs (Ficus benjamina)

Brisbane is changing.  When people say this, they usually refer to the cosmopolitan aspirations of a city no longer content to be regarded as an overgrown country town. It is now a city that caters to an affluent, expansive and modern middle class, offering fine-dining, bars, shopping precincts and lifestyle options that rival those found in Sydney and Melbourne, perhaps for the first time in its history. But I have lived here long enough to notice other ways in which Brisbane is changing. Rainbow Lorikeet, Bracken Ridge When I was a young boy with a bird interest, I could study the feathered visitors to my garden and neighbourhood for hours. I especially loved the evenly-mixed flocks of Rainbow (Trichoglossus haematodus) and Scaly-breasted Lorikeets (T. chlorolepidotus) that would visit the grevilleas Mum had planted around our housing commission yard in Bracken Ridge. Today, the Rainbow Lorikeets are as numerous as ever around Brisbane's suburbs, but the Scaly-breasted &#