Magnificent Redgums
The 23rd of March is National Eucalypt Day, so the subject of today’s post is my favourite tree: Eucalyptus camaldulensis, the majestic River Redgum.
Dotted throughout the paddocks in the more rural areas, lining the banks of Findon and Darebin Creeks, or featured in parks and reserves among the housing areas, redgums are a striking feature of our local landscape. Each one is sculpted by the elements into a unique form, leaning away from the prevailing winds, its smooth white branches bent into twisted shapes. The thick, gnarled trunk is covered in rough bark around its base, while higher up the weathered grey covering flakes away to reveal smooth limbs of white, pink, and gold. Among the narrow blue-green leaves you will find clusters of tiny buds with conical caps and small, creamy blossoms; there is nothing pretentious or flamboyant about the rugged redgum. It embodies modesty, strength and determination.
Paddock remnant trees along Bridge Inn Rd at Mernda, taken in 2019 not long after the railway line had reopened.
For someone who has grown up among the gum trees it is strange to think that they can be seen as unappealing. My mother, who immigrated from the Netherlands, described her early impression of the Australian landscape as dry and monotonous, with nothing but grey trees everywhere. Over time she came to appreciate the unique appeal of our “land of sweeping plains”, and felt at home among the gumtrees.
The early European settlers had it the same way. With the help of organisations such as the Acclimatisation Society of Victoria they introduced plants and animals which would help make what they saw as a strange and hostile environment more familiar: windbreaks of cypress, willows by the creeks and hedgerows of hawthorn, blackberries and dog-roses. They compared the drab gum trees unfavourably with the lush green trees of home. Not everyone agreed, however. In my research for Silent Sentinel I stumbled across a Melbourne-based journalist who wrote under the pen-name “Vagabond”. In an article for the Age he describes travelling from Melbourne to Whittlesea to see the “works” at Yan Yean. I will write more about this interesting account in another post. For now I want to share his views on redgums.
“There are many English trees planted in the neighborhood of the capital"," he writes, “whose changing leaf gives a tone of color to the landscape. There are hips and haws for the sparrows to feed on… The glories of the North American forest, and of English meads and woodlands are favorite themes for travellers to enlarge upon.
The scantiest of justice has been done to our Australian trees. The eucalypt is generally passed by with the criticism that it is gnarled and ugly. Yet there are many gum trees left standing around Melbourne as beautiful in form as any spreading oak in English park.” (The Age, Saturday May 21, 1887)
The previous year, in the Argus, he wrote about redgums being ringbarked to clear land for farming in Gippsland. His advice was that “not only from a picturesque point of view but from an utilitarian this destruction of timber in Australia both by nature and man is to be deplored. For the rainfall is sure to be affected thereby.” (The Argus, Sat Jan 9 1886)
Today I stand under the canopy of an ancient redgum and listen to the raucous chorus of lorikeets, noisy miners and cockatoos competing with the melodious warbling of a magpie. The leaves dance in the breeze, flickering gold and silver in the morning sunlight. A shield beetle crawls up the smooth bark of the massive trunk. Its girth wider than my outstretched arms. It must be three hundred years old at least. I wonder what stories it could tell?
Click on this image to find out more about National Eucalypt Day events, and to see the results for the “Tree of the Year” competition. (No prizes for guessing which tree got my vote!)
*The articles by “Vagabond” were found through the National Library of Australia’s invaluable resource Trove .