Melaleucas doing it Tough
Leigh Murray
Last year, in the April and July issues of "Native Plants for New South Wales", Warren and Gloria Sheather described several Western Australian melaleucas that they grow successfully in their harsh climate near Armidale. Our melaleucas survive, but most don't thrive; they do it tough. Ivan Holliday's excellent book on melaleucas points out that many melaleucas grow naturally either in swampy areas or in dry areas that are subject to brief periods of inundation. These conditions we do not have. What we have is dryness, in spades.
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| Field Guide to Melaleucas |
Ivan Holliday's 'Field Guide to Melaleucas' was published in 1987 and may still be available. It is an excellent treatment of the genus with descriptions and photographs of most species. Ivan subsequently published Volume 2 in 1997 to update the earlier work for new species and name changes.
A review of Volume 2 can be found here.
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Under pines
I began planting at our holiday house at Tuross Head eight years ago. If I'd known then how dry it is under large Norfolk Island pines, I probably wouldn't have planted any melaleucas there. Yet Melaleuca huegelii, M.elliptica, M.lateritia and M.incana have done well; M.armillaris 'Green Globe', M.thymifolia and M.pulchella have just coped, and M.coccinea and M.hypericifolia have barely managed to hang on with gritted teeth. (In a better area, M.hypericifolia 'Ulladulla Beacon' is doing nicely, as is M.fulgens.) The M.huegelii and M.lateritia flower well each year, and appreciate frequent light pruning. M.elliptica struggled during the drought, but they survived and now flower sporadically from spring to autumn with wonderful dark pinky-red brushes.
Wind tunnel
Our adjoining neighbour at Tuross built a brick wall along part of our common boundary. This solid wall channels the wind, intensifying it so that nor'easters and southerlies belt up and down our eastern boundary with amazing strength. It is in these conditions that we grow our most successful melaleuca, M.nesophila. We've used them as a tall screen between the boundary and a path, and they're brilliant. I've kept the M.nesophila pruned into a tall, flat shape. They're about 5 metres tall, 3 metres wide and less than a metre deep, and they provide almost total privacy from our neighbours. A dwarf form, M.nesophila 'Little Nessie', was planted six months ago along the other side of that pathway, and so far they're growing as well as their tall relatives.
Rocky ridge
At Queanbeyan, our west-facing shale ridge with scant soil provides even more challenges than Tuross. Drainage is excellent on the steep slopes. In summer, hot winds desiccate plants and bake bare soil to powder; soil becomes water repellent, and rain from storms streaks off downhill. In winter, frequent heavy frosts stress plants and further dry out the soil. Melaleuca thymifolia, M.lateritia, M.incana and M.wilsonii do passably well, but splendid specimens they are not. Ditto our gangly M.armillaris and M.decussata. They all look tatty, partly from the hard conditions and partly because they've not been adequately pruned.
Salt, frost and drought
Unlike other plants, none of our melaleucas has had obvious damage from salt-laden winds. But it's a different story with frost. Quite a few melaleucas clearly dislike frosts down to -7oC or lower, especially in their early years. We grow several species under the cover of large eucalypts, where no frost forms. After 15 years there, a Melaleuca nesophila has only reached a measly half metre but M.hypehcifolia, M.armillaris and M.incana are doing okay. Grown out in the open, M.lateritia, M.wilsonii, M.thymifolia, M.decussata and a pink form of M.armillaris are not usually affected by frost. Hessian 'hats' for the first winter or two have helped some young ones in the frostiest spots. During the drought, our melaleucas coped well. The M.nesophila forming our boundary screen lost their lowest leaves (leaving an unwanted gap, now being filled in by climbers), one M.elliptica and a M.coccinea died, and the others all came through looking only slightly shabbier.
Creatures featured
Some of the visitors to our gardens are guests; some are pests. Honeyeaters, cordially invited, relish the nectar-rich flowers of M.lateritia, M.hypericifolia, M.elliptica and M.fulgens during summer when other such flowers are scarce. Sadly, few 'good' insects visit our melaleuca flowers. On the plus side, not many 'bad' ones drop in either. Melaleucas seem untroubled by the spider mites and other sap-suckers that harm many of our other plants, although webbing caterpillars attack M.thymifolia, M.armillaris and M.pulchella. Wallabies (welcome visitors) and rabbits (unwelcome) nip off unprotected young plants. Before I began enclosing new plants in gutter guard, a whole batch of M.wilsonii was gobbled soon after planting (they're recovering slowly). Older plants aren't usually eaten. Ringtail possums, said to fancy M.armillaris for nesting, shun our skimpy specimens.
Potential unrealised
Most of our melaleucas are not at their best, with sparser foliage, fewer flowers and lass nectar for birds and insects than they'd have in more suitable conditions. Planned changes include repeated light pruning, heavier mulching, deep-watering granules to re-wet the soil, and soil improvement by the addition of compost. I'm hoping these measures will help our melaleucas come closer to realising their full potential for both beauty and wildlife attraction.
From 'Native Plants for New South Wales', newsletter of the Australian Plants Society (NSW), July 2006.
Australian Plants online - 2006
Association of Societies for Growing Australian Plants
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