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Smokebushes

Conospermum

Smokebushes
Photo: Poyt448 Peter Woodard, CC BY-SA 3.0

Conospermum is a genus of about 50 Australian shrubs and small trees in the Protea family, known as smokebushes for their wispy blue or grey flower heads. Most are native to south-west Western Australia and they are rarely grown in gardens, being difficult to propagate and cultivate.

Family
Proteaceae (Protea family)
Light
Full sun
Soil
Well-drained, low-nutrient soil, as in their native habitat.
How easy
Hard

About

Conospermum is a genus of about 50 species of flowering plants in the family Proteaceae that are endemic to Australia. Members of the genus are known as smokebushes - from a distance, their wispy heads of blue or grey flowers resemble puffs of smoke. They have an unusual pollination method that sometimes leads to the death of visiting insects. They are found in all Australian states, though most occur only in Western Australia. Smokebushes are rarely cultivated, though the flowers of several Western Australian species are harvested for the cut flower industry.

How to grow it

Although not common in horticulture, some members of the genus Conospermum, especially the Western Australian smoke bushes are particularly attractive. The western species are difficult to propagate and the eastern ones are not of great horticultural potential.

Four species—summer smokebush (C. crassinervium), plume smokebush (C. incurvum), common smokebush (C. stoechadis) and tree smokebush (C. triplinervium)—are used in the cut flower industry. Mostly harvested from the wild, they are difficult to cultivate, although information on growing 6 species on a commercial scale is available.

Where it grows

Conospermum species are found in all mainland Australian states. Most species occur in the south-west of Western Australia but six species occur in New South Wales and one in Tasmania.

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Conospermum by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

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