Landscape Profile Remnant Native Vegetation Survey - Site Inventory Agnes Banks. There are 3 sites specifically in this suburb. The establishment of a nature reserve having an area of approximately 66 hectares on Rickards Road at Agnes Banks was first proposed by the National Parks and Wildlife Service to Penrith City Council in 1987. The region according to the Service contained distinctive vegetation which needed to be retained for scientific research purposes. At Agnes Banks near Richmond is an isolated deposit of windblown sand with an interesting shrub-dominated community, floristically similar to that found on coastal sand dunes such as Myall Lakes, and in the eastern suburbs of Sydney before European settlement.
Vegetation ranges from woodland to low woodland, with small areas of open-scrub.
Banksia serrata and the closely related Banksia aemula are generally a smaller but very distinctive tree species found on well drained sites. The Agnes Banks high level sand deposits have been subject to extractive industry operations since the 1950s. The material in these deposits is thought to be wind blown sands originating from the Grose Valley and not associated with the sedimentary sand deposits of the Nepean River Valley. The sands overlie clay deposits. Leaching action has created a grading within the deposits and in some areas the upper levels have a significant organic content.