The Qualup bell - one of Western Australia's rarer wildflowers

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While we were in the Ravensthorpe/Hopetoun area on the weekend we went into the Fitzgerald River National Park and were lucky enough to find a number of Qualup Bell bushes. This has the botanical name of Pimelea physodes and is native to the south coast of Western Australia. When I researched the plant I discovered that it can be purchased on grafted root stock for home gardeners and is popular as a cut flower. It grows to about a metre tall and has drooping heads of flowers. The bracts start off as pale green turning to cream with red or purple streaks as the flowers mature. It is not particularly common and has been adopted as a symbol of Ravensthorpe and appears on a number of souvenir type items. I’ve shown the immature and more mature flower so you can see the different colouration.