Flora
The dominant vegetation in the park is eucalypt woodland and gallery forest associated with waterways. There are a variety of eucalypt species, including bloodwoods and Moreton Bay Ash. Wattles are also relatively common including Northern Black Wattle and lancewood (northern golden wattle). Paperbarks are also present especially near water, such as the weeping paperbark Weeping Paperbark. Melaleuca cajuputi is also present and has white bottlebrush-type flowers.
One of the attractive species in the park is the beautiful palm, Corypha utan. They tend to grow close to waterways and cope well with flooding that occurs during the wet season (monsoon). At the end of the life of the palm, which may be 75 to 100 years, it produces a large terminal inflorescence about a metre high with a prodigious number of flowers. One estimate is that they produce one million flowers. When flowering and seeding is complete the palm dies. Regeneration of Corpyha is quite healthy at Lakefield. The common name for the palm locally is "Kennedy Palm" or "Gebang Palm". Corypha utan is confined to Northern Australia but is not endemic, being also found in the Philippines and India. Nearer the coast there are also healthy mangrove ecosystems and salt flats.
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“A man’s interest in a single bluebird is worth more than a complete but dry list of the fauna and flora of a town.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)