the orchards are in flower for their bees to gather honey and assist in the pollination and setting of fruit. A large well known commercial nursery exists on Canoelands Road which supplies major retail nursery outlets throughout NSW. There is an aggregate quarry and a sandstone quarry in the area. The Hawkesbury sandstone is a basically cream-colored sedimentary rock with colorful patterns of red, orange, yellow and white. It was once used to build houses but is now used as dimension stone and sawn stone, principally for landscaping architecture or as feature panels in housing. The area also contains some lenses of white and blue shale, the former being used as an admixture with clay to make blonde housebricks. Services No shopping facility is available in Canoelands, the nearest being in Glenorie or in the major regional shopping centre of Castle Hill, some 32 km to the south. The Canoelands Rural Fire Brigade station and the local optical fibre telephone exchange are both located at the corner of Canoelands and Old Northern Roads. The area has single and 3-phase electricity, natural gas, telephone and broadband services online but is without reticulated water or sewerage, residents relying on rainwater tanks and dams for water and on septic systems for sewage disposal. Many homes have stand-by diesel-powered generators to safeguard the operation of their water supply pumps and refrigeration in case of power blackouts. One residence is fully solar-powered. The Sydney-Newcastle oil/gas pipeline runs along a good length of Canoelands Road before turning north to go under the Hawkesbury River and has two radio-controlled valve stations in Canoelands. References External links [CC-By-SA] Suburbs of Sydney Hornsby Shire