The ABC’s Gardening Australia TV program broadcast on Friday the 25th of October 2019, featured a segment on the University of Adelaide Laidlaw plantation with Waite Arboretum curator Dr. Kate Delaporte.
With more than 700 species, eucalypts dominate our landscapes with their look and smell, but many are too large for small gardens.
At the University of Adelaide’s Waite campus, scientists are working on a perfect gum tree for the home garden.
Dr Kate Delaporte is the curator at the Waite Arboretum and she loves gum trees: “They fit all sorts of niches in our environment and provide habitat for our birds and animals.”
She knows that a lot of gardeners won’t grow a gum tree because of the perception that they all grow into huge trees, but there are small eucalypts with beautiful flowers. Kate spent four years crossing different species looking for small, ornamental trees that were suitable for gardens and cut flowers; she has filled a corner of the arboretum with her stunning results.
