Clover Creek via Bourke
N.S. Wales
August 27th 1890
Baron Von Mueller Ph & M.D.
Dear Sir
Yours of 8th inst, in answer to my enquiries about the Burr Daisy,
duly reached me. — and I thank you much for the information so kindly supplied by
you about it. — By this mail I am sending to you,
under separate cover, two more samples (No 2) of the "
", in Company with some other plant specimens, one of these samples has the fruit
of it ripe, the other one is in bloom, hereabouts its habitat is on white clay flats
and it grows to the height of from 2½ feet to 3 feet, in the vulgar nomenclature it
is called the blue bush, at one time it was very plentiful but is now getting rather
scarce, as Stock are partial to it.
The Saltbush plants hereabouts are not at present in seed but when they are so I will
get all the varieties that I possibly can of them collected and sent to you and as
you wish I will also ask my neighbours round here to assist me in doing this for you.
All the saltbush plants growing in this quarter are eagerly fed on by Stock and they
are not at all so plentiful as they once were, indeed in many places where they formerly
luxuriated their absence has now to be supplied by giving Stock Rock Salt. It is a
great pity that more care was not taken to prevent their being eradicated, to the
extent that they have been. Another grand fodder plant "
," in common nomenclature "
Cotton bush
" which formerly was very plentiful is also now getting very Scarce and I believe,
that, unless the Governments of the different Colonies take means to preserve specimens
of all the most useful native fodder plants, by cultivating them in growth, some of
the best of them will soon become extinct, — which would be a great national loss.
—
Yours faithfully
John MacKay
