Grass trees are a great example, having a skirt of long, thin leaves, with a flower spike emerging from the centre bearing numerous, small, white flowers that attract the pollinating visitors.
What the Aussies and the Kiwis once saw as little more than weeds - those marvellous tree ferns (Dicksonia antartica and Cyathea australis), the
grass trees, the New Zealand flax (phormiums) and bottle brushes (callistemons) - and dumped on the tip with the rest of the week's garden refuse, we are importing in increasing quantities.
Mort and Viv took us through the bush talking freely about their foods, their plants, trees, ways of living and surviving in the bush, the multiple ways of using
grass trees, Xanthorrhoea species, as a food (the nutritious section of the inner plant), a medicine, a house (curl up under the lower fronds where the ground is always dry), a bed (make a base with the older fronds and use the newer ones as a waterproof layer on top), a fuel (burn the trunk on the fire) and for implements and furniture (from the main trunk).