31 October, 2014

Spring in Brisbane

This is our street
As you might have inferred from this post about summer earlier this week, spring in Brisbane is also quite different to Tokyo. For starters, its quite warm. This week it's been over 30 degrees Celsius every day.

 But the signs of spring, an Australian spring, are still around.
They are lovely shade trees too, once they have their leaves.
The most striking, in Brisbane, is the purple Jacaranda tree. It isn't a native Australian tree, but there are plenty around and they are gorgeous. Beautiful in a similar way to the Sakura or Japanese cherry blossoms. They gain their purple flowers in spring (October/November) before their leaves come in.

 Just as I love being surprised in Japan by the subtle pink flowered tree in random places around the city, it is the same with the Jacarandas. This is their time of the year to shine. Even better than sakura, they flower for longer than just a few days, several week. They also carpet the ground with their fallen flowers.

 It is a common story at uni that if you haven't begun to study for your year-end exams by the time the jacaranda are blooming, you're in trouble.
I took this from the overpass at our local train station. I just love how
the trees stand out in spring. (Sorry, dodgy Smart Phone photo.)

That's our driveway.
Australian Silky Oak in our neighbours yard.


The Australian Silky Oak leaves when
they've dried up on our driveway.



 The tree I wasn't so familiar with the name of is (I think) the Australian Silky Oak, part of the Grevillea family. I'm familiar with its leaves, they drop everywhere and make an awful mess. But I wasn't aware that they flowered beautifully in the spring, with orange flowers.

 I never was a gardening-kind of person. Despite growing up with a mum who loved her garden. However, moving between countries has heightened my appreciation of the different flora in different countries. Spring is much more subtle in Australia because most of the trees are evergreens. But if you've eyes to notice, the signs are there.
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1 comment:

  1. Caroline02 November, 2014 14:07

    I love silky oaks! In the part of Melbourne where I live, you don't see many jacarandas, but there seem to be silky oaks in nearly everyone's yard. Most of them are still only half out - the flowers are still more red than golden - but on a sunny day when they're in full flower they make me think that if they flowered slightly later they'd be good Christmas trees just as they are.

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