Proteaceae, Banksia, Macadamia nuts and the Annals of Botany Cover

Our videoblog discusses plants in the family Proteaceae, a well-known Southern hemisphere family with many beautiful and well-known representatives in Africa and Australia. The striking red flowers of the genus Leucospermum, from South Africa feature on the cover of the Annals of Botany for this year. Banksia is a well-known Australian genus, the bottle brush flowers, with attractive flowers and remarkable cone-like fruits. Protea, the type genus for the family, is from South Africa; the name of both genus and family is apposite, being named after the Greek God Proteus who was very variable in his form. Interestingly, there are no important food crops originating from Australia, despite its large area and range of climatic zones, and the now world-wide importance of Eucalyptus as a tree for construction timbers and paper-making fibre. In the family Proteaceae, Macadamia is the most internationally-significant food plant of any Australian native species; it’s very fat-rich nuts (75%) are widely available and much appreciated.

The videoblog is on YouTube: