Icy mornings, flowering wattle

One of the joys of the Australian bush is the flowers of winter. Opportunism sparks the blooming of many plants, and we have had decent rain this year, so the bush here on the southeast coast is quite painterly. Last month, the dominant colour was Danish-butter cream, now American-butter yellow.

Rime sharpens every leaf on the ground these mornings, yet the air is perfumed with many wattles. Acacia, as they are properly called, is a genus with many species. As the Australian National Botanical Gardens states, "There are some 1350 species of Acacia found throughout the world and close to 1000 of these are to be found in Australia."

There are many species here, all full of personality, to their very smell. They range from honey-butter to Concord grape. Some ooze a deliciously tannic exudance that looks exactly like artists' gum.

As for the flowers, "Individual flowers are arranged in inflorescences that may be either globular heads or cylindrical spikes."

Inflorescence is a word that intrigues me.

Apocalypse

War

Battle

Skirmish

Disagreement

Inflorescence

Flower

Seed

Earth