Thinking Long term

Thinking long term By Spencer Shaw The human mind is a curious thing when you think about it (especially when you’ve got to use the human mind to think about the human mind, oops I’m getting dizzy). Until recently if you saw something really big you either killed it and ate it or chopped it down and broke it into much smaller bits. Now psychologists could probably analyse this as some deep seated insecurity on our behalf, and it probably is. But I don’t think we can hide from our competitive natures and a classic case of this was the ‘beating of the bush’. Early settlers often stood in awe of the forest giants they met, especially after they cut them down so they could accurately measure them. The bit I don’t think they understood was that once they cut it down to see how big a tree it was, they weren’t measuring the tree they where measuring a big dead thing.Some of our forest giants are fruiting or about to fruit over the next few months. Flindersia schottiana or Bumpy ash are fruiting at the moment so keep your eyes open for them. The pods are about 100mm long slightly bumpy and green. When ripe the pods open up like five petalled flowers releasing upto 30 seed to be spread by the wind. Bumpy ash is one of those species that quite often go a few years without fruiting (apart from odd individuals – no offence to odd individuals!) and it has been four years since the last big seeding event on the range. When the time comes however these trees make up for their infrequent fruiting by covering the ground with seed that given a bit of rain will become a carpet of seedlings, each vying for their place in the sun and the chance to one day be a forest giant. Bumpy ash are a very attractive tree that in spite of the infrequent fruiting produce masses of white blossoms every year in late spring to early summer. Their timber can have a beautiful light yellow grain, and is surprisingly heavy and durable for such a quick growing tree. Collect the fruit when some start to split open on the tree (this sounds a lot easier than it actually is because the fruit are usually held on the higher branches). Place the fruit in a warm place and they should then open and shed the seed. The seed are easy to germinate as long as they are fresh, so sow them as soon as you get them. Place the flat seed on your seed raising mix and cover with no more than a few millimetres of seed raising mix, then keep them moist but not too wet and in a few weeks the whole surface of the propagation tray should start to lift as the seedlings emerge. Then prick them out, pot them up, plant them out and wait. And there you have it within a few hundred years you’ll be responsible for the return of one of our magnificent forest giants to the soils of the Blackall range – that’s if you can wait that long! Sloanea woolsii or Yellow Carabeen is another of our forest giants that rarely produces good crops or at least crops that are within reach of us mere mortals. These are one of our true forest giants of East Coast Australia, members of the upto 55m category! These trees can often be recognised within the forest even if you can’t see their leaves by the massive buttresses that support the base of the tree. These buttresses are your classic plank buttresses that are thin and parallel sided, extending upto 5m high on the trunk. You can’t help but to be touched by the awesome spectacle of the pure ‘bigness’ of one of these forest giants and the timelessness that they symbolise. The flowers that appear in late spring are white and hang downward in clusters and the trees can often be very impressive in bloom. The fruit which are a spiky capsule that ripens in late summer turn from green to a yellow-brown and split open to reveal upto two but more commonly one seed. The black-brown seed are upto 10mm long and mostly covered in an orange layer of flesh called an aril. The seed should be collected fresh from the tree or at least recently fallen. The fruit should be removed and then the seeds soaked for a few days to help remove the aril, as soon as you have the seed clean sow and watch it grow. Like the Bumpy ash, when you plant one of these trees (in the right place of course) you are making one of the greatest bequests any of us can make for the planet or future generations. In our lifetime we will see a beautiful tree grow and thrive, but we should keep in mind that the tree we help establish may live long enough to see the next millennium. Wow!Other seed falling in  Feb-AprilArchontophoenix cunninghamiana – Picabeen PalmCanarium austalasicum – Mango BarkEndiandra pubens – Hairy WalnutPilidiostigma glabrum – Plum MyrtleRhodamnia argentea – Silver MyrtleSloanea australis – Maidens BlushSyzygium oleosum – Blue lillypilly