November-December in the GeoRegion is the flowering time on Hawkesbury Sandstone ridgetops for dwarf apple Angophora hispida. “Dwarf apple” seems like a strange name for a plant whose copious and densely-packed flowers might lead it to be called “cauliflower tree”; however early settlers likened the contorted limbs of the much larger, very familiar Sydney red gum Angophora costata to ageing trees in European apple orchards.

The “apple” name has flowed through to closely related species. The flowers of the stocky and bushy dwarf apple are prolific and full of nectar and attract bees, ants, beetles and butterflies in droves. The most striking looking of the beetles are the fiddlers, named from “violin” shape patterns in their wing case colouring.

Fiddler beetles (Eupoecila australasiae) measure 15–20 millimetres in length, their bodies patterned dark brown and lime green to yellow. They are found in eastern Australia, in Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, and southeastern South Australia, and live in heathland and eucalypt woodland, as well as suburban parks and gardens.

Eggs are laid in rotting logs, or in debris or soil. The larvae eat rotting wood until they mature and pupate there by making a cocoon-like chamber within the wood. Adult beetles burrow through the soil and emerge in early summer, and feed on nectar-laden flowers. These include Angophora hispida and A. woodsiana, Backhousia citriodora, and Melaleuca linariifolia