Plants of South Eastern New South Wales

Hedychium gardnerianum

Flowering stems. Photographer Jackie Miles

Seeding plants. Photographer Jackie Miles

Common name

Ginger lily

Family

Zingiberaceae

Where found

Forest, grasslands, disturbed sites, wetlands, and near streams. Occasionally an epiphyte on trees. Coastal north of Bega. Ranges north from Barren Grounds Nature Reserve west of Kiama. Southern Highlands..

Notes

Introduced perennial herb to 2.5 m high, growing annually from branched rhizomes. Arils on seeds fleshy. Leaves alternating up the stems, 20-45 cm long, 100-150 mm wide, somewhat leathery, tips pointed; ligule broad and membranous. Flowers pleasantly scented, bright yellow, tubular, the tube about 50 mm long, with 3 narrow lobes 35-50 mm long. A fourth smaller spoon-shaped two-lobed petal-like structure, 25-30 mm long, 8-13 mm wide. A single stamen, the filament bright red. Flowers in many-flowered spike-like clusters 15–45 cm long. Flowering: mostly summer–autumn. Inner surface of the open seed case orange; seeds with a bright red aril.

General Biosecurity Duty all NSW.

PlantNET description:  http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Hedychium~gardnerianum  (accessed 19 January, 2021)