H. D. Graham Sugar Gums - Avenue to be Honoured?

Next time you find yourself at the 100 Steps, go in the opposite direction to Laverton Creek and walk along the western edge of Truganina Park towards Queen Street. As you meander along the path in a northerly direction, take a look at the trees. You’re walking beside an avenue of sugar gums (Eucalyptus cladocalyx).  

There are over a hundred in total, each one socially distanced from the next. Some of the single trunked species have diameters over three metres. Other trees are multi-trunked, almost mallee-like. Their original trunks may have died through lopping or natural causes, but new growth has thrived over time. Each tree has its own personality. One resembles the Venus de Milo. Another is Merlinesque. 

The parade of trees is being nominated by community members with the support of Hobsons Bay City Council for inclusion on the National Trust’s Significant Trees register. Their nomination follows the successful inclusion of the Logan Reserve Moreton Bay fig (Ficus macrophylla) earlier this year. 

It is unclear exactly when the trees were planted, but in an aerial photo taken in 1934, the trees are already looking relatively mature. Who planted them is a mystery. The avenue originally represented the western boundary of the Truganina Explosives Reserve following a land swap in 1900 between the Crown and one of the Chirnside family, so perhaps they were a boundary marker. The trees run for almost a kilometre in length. In some places, there are now gaps where trees have died or where recently built pathways have created an interruption. 

Sugar gums, although endemic to a few small areas of South Australia and Kangaroo Island, are a common planting in Victoria, particularly on the basalt plains of Melbourne. They are hardy and fast-growing, attractive in appearance, not unlike a darker, stockier version of the more celebrated river red gum (Eucalyptus camaldulensis).  

Drive around the rural parts of Victoria and you will see many sugar gums planted as windbreaks or cadastral markers. In the 1920s, the Princes Highway was planted with over thirty thousand sugar gums from Brooklyn to Geelong as a tribute to the first chairman of the Country Roads Board, William Calder. Some of those original plantings are still alive today and large examples can be seen around places like Little River. An avenue of almost seventy trees, planted along the Geelong Road in Werribee, is already listed on the National Trust register.  

As for the name, it is not undeserved. Next time you walk past these trees, look for the younger leaves which are more rounded than the sickle-shaped older leaves. These juvenile leaves contain high levels of glucoside. Take a bite and you’ll notice a familiar taste. 

Hopefully, the National Trust will recognise the significance of these trees. If so, it will be the sweetest victory.