Kunzea Species, Scarlet Kunzea

My mother used to live in Southern California USA and that house had a large Kunzea red bottle brush shrub that was almost always covered...Read More in countless hummingbirds. 40 years later, I find the same species for sale at Annies Annuals. I kept it in a pot in Phoenix, Arizona and it lived for a couple months then died. I am not sure but I think I may have overwatered it. Almost every plant I got from Annies Annuals has died, except ONE.

This is a beautiful shrub from Western Australia. It has soft green crowded leaves and large bright red bottlebrush flower heads, sprinkl...Read Moreed with the yellow tips of the anthers. I have a well-established shrub in my garden and its beautiful flowers are very attractive to the honeyeaters when in flower. I have intended to collect seed, but the seed capsules are also attractive to the birds, our local parrot, the Crimson Rosella comes to the shrub before the seed are fully ripe and demolishes every seed capsule, eating the seed. A couple of seedlings have appeared below the main shrub from seed spilled by the rosellas. Grows well from both seed and cuttings.