Growers branch out as demand grows for unique Australian native flowers
Paul Dalley is successfully growing Sturt's desert pea in his Mid North Coast nursery. (ABC Rural: Lauren Bohane)
Nestled within the lush green bushland of the NSW Mid North Coast, Paul Dalley's flower farm is the last place a crop of Sturt's desert pea would be expected to thrive.
The floral emblem of South Australia normally grows in the outback, in arid conditions and sandy soil, but Mr Dalley is growing the flower in a greenhouse in Kempsey, where dozens of the native desert flowers are in full bloom.
Before Mr Dalley attempted to grow the flower last year, he had only seen it once, at Melbourne's botanic gardens.
"We just like growing things that are beautiful and different, and nobody else is growing," he said.
"They're beautiful, they're unique, a lot of people have seen pictures but have never seen them for real."
Paul Dalley loves the challenge of unique Australian blooms. (ABC Rural: Lauren Bohane)
Mr Dalley had about 40 plants in this year's crop, each sporting several flowers.
"We're doing much better than last year when most of the plants died off, and we only got about half a dozen flowers from 10 plants," he said.
But he said the challenge was what drew him to unusual flowers.
Paul Dalley plans to collect seeds from this year's crop of Sturt's desert pea. (ABC News: Lauren Bohane)
"Some of our crops are more on the mainstream side, and some are more far out, and some of them fail altogether," he said.
"It's a bit like gambling, but I don't gamble, so I buy exotic plants and seeds."
Mr Dalley said there had been massive interest in the flowers, but he planned to save most of this year's crop for seeds.
In South Australia, Sturt's desert pea is considered a protected flora, meaning flowers and plants cannot be collected from private or Crown land without permission.
Growing interest in natives
Further south, on the NSW Central Coast, East Coast Wildflowers' Jonathan Lidbetter has been growing Sturt's desert pea for eight years.
"It normally grows in areas of rainfall of about 250-500 millimetres a year, and we routinely get over 1,100mm, so we must be mad," Mr Lidbetter said.
"We've had various quality issues with seed and haven't made it a huge focus until the last couple of years.
"In the last couple of years, we've really tried hard to grow it better, to make it more commercial and to make the product desirable for the customer."
Jonathan Lidbetter has been growing Sturt's desert pea for eight years. (Supplied: Jonathan Lidbetter)
The blooms were sold at Sydney Flower Markets, where Mr Lidbetter said there was growing interest in native flowers.
"There's a move to more interesting, delicate flowers that have not really been available before," he said.
"COVID partly brought in a little bit of interest in locally-grown native flowers [with] short flower miles."
Sturt's desert pea is notoriously difficult to grow outside of its native habitat. (ABC News: Lauren Bohane)
Mr Lidbetter said limited availability kept florists coming back to see what was in season.
"Seasonality keeps the florists interested in the market area because they're always coming in to see what's new, what's hitting the floor.
"A lot of their traditional flowers that they're used to, they're able to get 12 months a year, and they can just order them.
"A lot of the things that are now coming along in the native market line are very restricted supplies and often quite unusual."
Natives not always Australian-grown
The peak body for Australian flower growers and florists credited the rise in popularity of native flowers to Australians' growing desire to buy local.
"A lot of people in Australia relate them to being Australian-grown products, and there's a real trend towards wanting to buy and support Australian-grown flowers and Aussie businesses," Flower Industry Australia secretary Anna Jabour said.
Anna Jabour says native flowers are becoming more popular. (Supplied: Flower Industry Australia)
However, Ms Jabour warned Australian native did not always equate to Australian-grown when it came to flowers.
"I've seen kangaroo paw [and] some eucalyptus be imported, and that's why it's really important to ask where your flowers are from."
She said the flower industry had been advocating for mandated country-of-origin labelling for the past two decades.
"If there's no labelling telling people where flowers are from, a lot of the Australian public think that the flowers are just grown here," she said.
"Twenty-five years ago, that assumption would be correct; around 90 per cent or more of our flowers were grown here, but today it's only around 50 per cent."