From John MacKay   27 August 1890

Clover Creek via Bourke

N.S. Wales

August 27th 1890

Baron Von Mueller Ph & M.D.

Dear Sir

Yours of 8th inst, in answer to my enquiries about the Burr Daisy,¹ duly reached me. — and I thank you much for the information so kindly supplied by you about it. — By this mail I am sending to you,² under separate cover, two more samples (No 2) of the "Eremophila Bowmanii", in Company with some other plant specimens, one of these samples has the fruit of it ripe, the other one is in bloom, hereabouts its habitat is on white clay flats and it grows to the height of from 2 1/2 feet to 3 feet, in the vulgar nomenclature it is called the blue bush, at one time it was very plentiful but is now getting rather scarce, as Stock are partial to it.

The Saltbush plants hereabouts are not at present in seed but when they are so I will get all the varieties that I possibly can of them collected and sent to you and as you wish I will also ask my neighbours round here to assist me in doing this for you — All the saltbush plants growing in this quarter are eagerly fed on by Stock and they are not at all so plentiful as they once were, indeed in many places where they formerly luxuriated their absence has now to be supplied by giving Stock Rock Salt. — It is a great pity that more care was not taken to prevent their being eradicated, to the extent that they have been. Another grand fodder plant "Kochia," in common nomenclature "Cotton bush" which formerly was very plentiful is also now getting very Scarce and I believe, that, unless the Governments of the different Colonies take means to preserve specimens of all the most useful native fodder plants, by cultivating them in growth, — some of the best of them will soon become extinct, — which would be a great national loss. —

Yours faithfully

John MacKay

Eremophila Bowmanii

Kochia