Natives & coastal icons
Coastal Banksia
Banksia integrifolia
The coastal banksia is the toughest tree on the bayside: it grows in pure sand, drinks salt wind and still flowers through the coldest months of the year. The gnarled, wind-sculpted specimens along the Sandringham and Beaumaris clifftops are some of the most characterful trees in the south east.
How to spot a coastal banksia
Leaves
Dark green on top with a pale silver-white underside, so the whole tree flashes silver when the sea breeze turns the foliage over.
Flowers
Pale lemon-yellow cylindrical spikes, roughly the size of a soft drink can, mostly autumn through winter when little else is flowering.
Seed cones
Spent spikes harden into knobbly grey cones that hang on the branches for years.
Bark
Rough, knobbly and tan-grey, often on twisting, leaning trunks.
Form
Wind-pruned and sculptural on the exposed coast, but a surprisingly tall, straight tree of 15 metres or more in sheltered gardens.
Where you'll see it around the south east
Foreshore reserves and clifftops from Brighton through Hampton to Sandringham, remnant heathland pockets along Beach Road, and increasingly in gardens as bayside owners replant coastal natives. Older beachside streets often have one leaning over a fence line.
Worth knowing
This was one of the first Australian plants collected by Joseph Banks at Botany Bay in 1770, and the whole banksia genus is named for him. Its winter flowers are a critical nectar source for honeyeaters, lorikeets and possums when almost nothing else on the coast is in bloom.
Easily confused with
The saw banksia has hard, saw-toothed leaves and a stouter trunk. Coast tea-tree is smaller with tiny leaves and papery white flowers. The silver leaf-back plus lemon flower spikes make the coastal banksia easy to confirm.
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