Yam daisies abound in Ballarat forests

Its tubers were a very important dietary item.

The flowers of the yam daisy are confusingly similar to those of dandelion-like weeds. Its main distinguishing features are its drooping buds and narrow leaves, which are seldom more than 10mm wide locally.

This plant is quite common in Ballarat’s forests and is flowering now. The murnong has had a few scientific name changes over the last couple of decades. In recent times it has gone from Microseris lanceolata to Microseris walteri.

At the same time, the much scarcer yam daisy from the basalt plains has become a species in its own right, with the name Microseris scapigera applied. There is a third yam daisy in the high country.

The recent name of Microseris walteri was originally given in 1918 by French botanist Marcel Gandoger. His plant came from Sandringham in Victoria. He named his yam daisy specimen after Charles Walter, a German-born botanist who collected plants in Victoria’s high country in the 1890s.

However, that name was not used officially until this year, when the yam daisy was split into three different species and a new name was needed for one of them.

Thus Mr Gandoger’s name – being the oldest – is now current.

The basalt plains yam daisy is a shorter plant with shorter-petalled flowers opening only for an hour or two, whereas those of the more common yam daisy remain open for up to two days.

Our local species of yam daisy was the main one eaten by indigenous people. It also has the plumpest, least-fibrous tuber. This tuber is replaced annually. The high country yam daisy is not definitely known to have been a Koori food plant.

In summer, the leaves die back and the tuber becomes dormant until it resprouts in autumn.

The name of the town of Myrniong, between Ballan and Bacchus Marsh, presumably comes from the native yam daisy or murnong plants that grew there at the time of early European settlement. The indigenous name of murnong is now being used more frequently for the yam daisy.

A first for Lake Wendouree is the current nesting of a small colony of little black cormorants. This species has never nested at the lake before.

The nests contain fast-growing chicks. There are also a few nests of little pied cormorants and numerous white ibis nests.

The cormorants’ nests tend to be higher above the water than those of the ibises.