Eucalyptus sieberi

A potentially large tree growing to a height to 45 m. It does not form a lignotuber.

It grows south from around Morisset in NSW, along the coast and tablelands, on the eastern side of the Great Dividing Range, through eastern and central Victoria, to as far west as around Ballarat. It also grows in north-eastern Tasmania, as far south as around Bicheno.

Commonly found in forests and woodland, often in pure stands, on soils of low to medium fertility. It forms a dominant part of some vegetation communities, usually where soil is sandy, but trees can be found, sometimes quite large, on transitional and clay-enriched soils. Usually found on higher ground especially ridgetop vegetation.

Bark is rough on the trunk and the larger branches (resembling ironbark in some case – a useful identification feature when taken with bare branches above), smooth, white to yellow bark above. The rough bark is thin and flaky on younger trees, but becomes thick and dark grey to black and furrowed with age.

Eucalyptus spp. have simple and usually alternate adult leaves with juvenile leaves starting off opposite to alternate (disjunct). In this species, juvenile / coppicing growth is elliptic to lanceolate or falcate, bluish-green to glaucous leaves, to 170 mm long and to 75 mm wide.
Adult leaves are the same shade of glossy green on both sides, lanceolate to falcate, to about 200 mm long and to 40 mm wide on a petiole to 20 mm long. The leaves strongly reflect the sunlight (glisten), hence its common name and a useful feature for identification.

The primary inflorescence of “eucalypts” (Angophora / Corymbia / Eucalyptus) is an umbellaster (an umbel-like cluster of flowers). In the flowers of Corymbia and Eucalyptus, the petals and sepals are fused into the distinctive calyptra / operculum (bud cap) which is shed when the flower opens (in some species, 2 bud caps (opercula) are shed). The flowers are conspicuously staminate – where many stamens are basically taking over the role of the petals, all surrounding one central carpel. In this species, the flower buds are arranged in leaf axils in umbellasters of between seven and fifteen. Mature buds are oval to club-shaped, to 5 mm long to 4 mm wide with a rounded or flattened operculum / calyptra. Flowering occurs from September to January and the flowers are white.

The fruit of eucalypts are a woody capsule (commonly called ‘gum nuts’) which come in a wide variety of shapes with the top part having a sunken, flat or raised disc and with the valves inserted, disc-level, exserted to strongly exserted. In this species, the capsules are distinctive and also help in identification. They are barrel-shaped or conical, to 11 mm long and to 9 mm wide with the valves near rim level. The top of the capsule can have a thick red disc and walls when ripe. They usually litter the ground heavily or frequently underneath continuous stands.