Book a vital resource on plants

Hedland green thumbs should find it easier to grow local plants in their gardens after Greening Australia last month published the first comprehensive guide to Pilbara plant species.

The non-profit land management group spent months photographing and profiling 240 local plants for its Pilbara Native Species book.

Greening Australia Pilbara program manager Mike Clark said it especially highlighted beautiful Pilbara plants that were hardy and suited to water-efficient and fertiliser-free gardens.

"(The Pilbara landscape) is amazing when it is in flower," he said.

"There are so many absolutely beautiful species and I'm thinking why aren't they growing those here (in Hedland). You could really transform this town."

The book's launch comes as the Town of Port Hedland, home gardeners and community garden groups look to transform Hedland's bare landscapes into greener, more welcoming environments.

Mr Clark said he hoped the book would help this transformation by showing residents there were options other than the foreign species that currently dominated local gardens.

IBN Services project manager Evelyn Kroczek said the book was a great resource for her nursery, run by Aboriginal group IBN Corporation.

She said it complemented the traditional knowledge her indigenous employees already possessed and was an important resource to help the nursery become the experts on Pilbara native plants and win large contracts for mine site revegetation.

"This book will (help) teach our people and skill them up on the scientific aspects of having a native nursery and growing native plants," she said.

Greening Australia national director Craig Anderson sees an even bigger market than the Pilbara.

"There is an opportunity for a local nursery industry here, but for me the bigger opportunity is the bigger markets … (in Australia and) the rest of the world," he said.

"Australia has been exporting a lot of our flowers, like banksias and wattles, for a long time.

"But we've got some species here in the Pilbara that are just as special, if not more special, that can be exported as a cut flower or even as a plant."