Whangārei Quarry Gardens

[sipalms]

Was in Northland New Zealand last week, and took a lunchtime stroll around the beautiful Whangārei Quarry Gardens. As the name suggests, it's an old quarry with a waterfall that has been dammed to create a lake and planted into a beautiful tropical botanic garden.

The focus is largely on tropical trees, flowers, shrubs, succulents/bromeliads, there is a nice palm selection as well however they haven't got anywhere near the amount of variety that could be grown there in my opinion.

Mostly there was Syagrus, Chamadorea, Livistonia, Archontophoenix, Rhopalostylis, Jubaea, Butia, Brahea, Sabal, ceroxylon among others. This spot would be perfect for trialling Roystonea and Wodyetia though. I would think Wodyetia would do very well around the Quarry walls as it is hot, humid and very much like the foxtails native habitat. Likewise Roystonea would get ample heat and sun and water and humidity.

Here's a very small selection of pics from my walk. Hope you enjoy.

 

I Quite like the arching Queen trunk. They have done this a lot throughout the gardens and it really amps up the tropical feel and turns a standard 'sentry' queen into a more softer, tropical looking palm. Queens are a very popular landscape palm in most warmer regions of New Zealand but in Northland they are becoming naturalized in places and also a rather boring palm compared to what could easily be grown.
 

 

There was an abundance of tropical flowers like hibiscus/plumeria as well as a massive camelia collection. Flower enthusiasts could easily spend several hours there as the collection is huge!
 

 

There were cycads all over the gardens in every nook and cranny and all looked very healthy and very much fitted the vibe.
 

 

Wasps having quite the feast on some butia seeds...
 

 

It was a very warm and extremely humid day for April. Felt like mid summer and the sun is noticeably hotter than down in the South Island. 8 degrees closer to the equator at 35S does make quite a difference from where I'm from.
 

 

Nice to see a ceroxylon there, it looked healthy but I wondered whether it would be to hot and humid there for this palm?

 

 

Monstera was everywhere and looked right at home.

 

Here is a classic lineup of 'Northland' Nikau form. As you will see, the further north in New Zealand, the tighter the fronds get until the Nikau seems to stop ocurring altogether north of about Kerikeri (at least not in abundance), and the form gets very spindly and frankly a bit ugly compared to the more robust southern varieties.
 

 

 

[sipalms]

Also in Whangārei not far away from the Quarry gardens is one of the very few pure Filifera I have ever seen in New Zealand.

W. robusta is pretty much a pest palm in Northern NZ but Filifera is virtually non-existent. Some would think that it would be too humid and wet for Filifera in Northland, but this one has clearly been doing just fine and was flowering/setting seed.

 

 

[sipalms]

I never know how to I.D reclinata or rupicola. Can someone help? Or are these a hybrid?

 

And here's a very nice Hedyscepe I noticed growing along the side of the road south of Whangārei 

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Edited April 20, 2021 by sipalms
Added photo

[Darold Petty]

Thanks for posting !  

[kinzyjr]

@sipalms Good stuff!  Thank you for sharing!

[palmfriend]

Great tour!

Thank you for posting!

best regards from Okinawa -

Lars

 

[Tyrone]

Thanks for posting. That's exactly the same altitude as where I live at 35S. Do you think that quarry ever sees below zero Celsius?

[sipalms]

I'm not from there so can't talk from experience.... but it would appear unlikely that they have ever had a proper frost there.

I just logged in the NZ climate database and looked up Whangarei, looks like the coldest temp recorded in the last 10 years was 0.7 degrees, that was in August 2011,  at the airport about 7km away.

[Tyrone]

4 hours ago, sipalms said:

I'm not from there so can't talk from experience.... but it would appear unlikely that they have ever had a proper frost there.

I just logged in the NZ climate database and looked up Whangarei, looks like the coldest temp recorded in the last 10 years was 0.7 degrees, that was in August 2011,  at the airport about 7km away.

I'm jealous. 

[Tyrone]

5 hours ago, Tyrone said:

Thanks for posting. That's exactly the same altitude as where I live at 35S. Do you think that quarry ever sees below zero Celsius?

Latitude not altitude. That's what I meant.

[Fusca]

7 hours ago, Tyrone said:

Latitude not altitude. That's what I meant.

As long as you don't have a bad altitude.