Grevilleas

Grevilleas are family Proteaceae plants, which are often confused with hakeas. As a general rule of thumb, grevilleas have flowers at the end of the shoot (terminal), and have papery seed capsules, whereas hakeas flower stalks usually arise from the leaf axil (where it joins the stem) and they have woody nuts. 
There are only two grevilleas in Foxes Lair, but several hakeas.
 Grevillea tenuiflora/Tassel grevillea  is a beautiful but atypical grevillea with narrow clustered flowers and a mildly rude pistil.
It has unusual and stunning flowers that remind me of a picture of marine spoon worms that my daughter sent from Korea. Koreans call them gaebul (penis fish), and consume them with relish to enhance their (ahem) vigour. Without claiming efficacy, I recommend a stroll on the Banksia Trail in September to see masses of the flowers. Latin scholars amongst you know that tenuiflora is a taxonomist’s way of saying ‘narrow flower’.

Tangled grevillea

Narrow pistil

Grevillea leptobotrys/ Tangled Grevillea is a great ground cover orclumping plant, which flowers on Banksia Trail brown stony gravels in November/December. Its germination is stimulated by fire.

Most grevilleas set few seed pods, but I discovered an exception when my daughter gave me a  Grevillea olivaceae plant for my native garden. It is a vigourous shrub which produces masses of yellow flowers, which all develop a pod containing a tasty kernel. red capped parrots got every kernel (which we enjoyed).