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Microseris walteri
Microseris walteri is an Australian perennial herb with yellow daisy-like flowers and small edible tuberous roots, one of three plants called murnong or yam daisy. It is a native wildflower of open dry forest, so it suits sunny, well-drained conditions rather than rich garden beds.
Microseris walteri is an Australian perennial herb with yellow flowers and edible tuberous roots, and one of three plants known as murnong or yam daisy along with Microseris scapigera and Microseris lanceolata.
The plant is found in southern parts of Australia, including Victoria, NSW, ACT, SA, WA and Tasmania. In Victoria, the plant is widespread and occupies a wide range of habitats, particularly dry open forest.
The edible tuberous roots of murnong plants were once a vitally important source of food for the Indigenous Australians. In the south-eastern parts of Australia, Indigenous women would dig for roots with a digging stick, also known as a yam stick, and they would carry the roots in a dillybag. The practice of digging for tubers and leaving part of the tuber, meant the soil was tilled and caused more plants to grow. Murnong was cooked by placing a dillybag of tubers onto an earth oven for roasting. The taste of the cooked tuber is described as 'sweet with a flavour of coconut'.
The introduction of cattle, sheep and goats by immigrating early–colonialist Europeans led to the near extinction of murnong, with calamitous results for first Australians' communities who depended upon murnong for a large part of their food.
Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Microseris walteri 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.
Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.
