New street tree for the Princess Highway Tempe

New street tree for the Princes Highway at Tempe (click to enlarge)

I was happy to see that Marrickville Council has planted a new street tree outside the petrol station on the Princes Highway Tempe.  I think it is a Blueberry ash (Elaecocarpus reticulates).

The Blueberry ash is a columnar shaped Australian native tree that grows to between 4-8 metres tall, but is unlikely to reach this height in these growing conditions.  It has dense blue-green foliage, red new growth & produces masses of pale pink flowers over spring/summer. The flowers have an aniseed fragrance.  It produces blue berries over winter that can remain on the tree for many months.   It is bird-attracting & they like both the flowers & the berries.  Cockatoos & Lorikeets especially love the berries.

The tree is planted outside the petrol station.  The owners of  the petrol station have gone to the trouble of landscaping the site with a range of Australian native bird-attracting plants, which is very nice to see.  I imagine they will appreciate this street tree.

Low Grevilleas planted at the entrance to the petrol station. It would be nice if Council used these on traffic islands instead of Nandina that offers nothing for wildlife