Eucalyptus glaucescens ‘Guthega’- Tingiringi Gum

How to use in the landscape and/or garden – How to grow or train it to get the best out of it :

A handsome, fast growing, large and versatile Eucalyptus; good specimen tree for the landscape, as a multi-stemmed bush for large planters, cut foliage and excellent for biomass.  Of the Eucalyptus grown for biomass, E. glaucescens is the least palatable to wildlife such as deer and rabbits.

 Eucalyptus glaucescens ‘Guthega’ is an exceptionally hardy form of the species as its provenance is the extremely cold ski resort in the Australian ‘Alps’.  Guthega the tree is also of good form and vigour.

Fabulous Specimen Tree for the wider landscape, arboretum collection or avenue planting and for the smaller, medium and larger garden. E. glaucescens grows into a very handsome tree

Commercially: a good choice for open public spaces, parks, business parks, university campus

Growing a full-sized standard: planting the tree and running away is an option, but it won’t necessarily give you the best results.

We suggest you maintain a leading shoot and tip prune the lateral shoots to encourage bushiness.  Keep all the sides shoots as they are building up the strength of the main trunk.

• To grow a large specimen, leave the tree to grow up naturally thereafter.
• For a small tree, tip prune the leader when it reaches 1.2m, thereafter let the head develop. Then prune the tree every March 18^th and end of May to keep your tree small and bushy.

For more, see our guidance notes for growing specimen Eucalyptus in our Help and Advice section.

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Growing shrub-on-a-stick clipped standard: this is an opportunity to grow a Eucalyptus in a confined space like a courtyard and also control its overall size. You can produce a small tree on a trunk with a height of anywhere between 2.4m (8ft) and 4m (12ft). Prune back growth every March 18^th or thereabouts and tip prune the annual growth back by up to 90% at the end of May. Light tip pruning can be done again during June/July, but no later. Don’t prune from August through to February.

See our Pruning Guidance Notes here

Growing a multi-stemmed bush or tree.  E. glaucescens responds well to coppicing and readily produces a multi-stemmed specimen  Coppice only once the tree has attained a trunk of some 125 mm in diameter.

Q: Why would you want to do this?

A: To create:

• a tree with more body or ‘mass’ of branches and foliage for screening purposes. Once grown back up to its full potential, it will now have several main trunks
• an attractive multi-stemmed architectural tree, especially if it has exceptional bark
• to control height, whereby your Euc can be usefully maintained anywhere between 2.4m (8ft) and 7m (20ft), but genetically it will want to grow taller if ignored.

REMEMBER: No grass, no weeds and a thick boring bark chip mulch, to a depth of 150 mm (6 inches) are essential to assist with good establishment. Our research trials have demonstrated that grass around the trunk of Eucalyptus prevent the trees from quickly establishing and can completely stop them from growing.

Pot Culture outdoors:  E. glaucescens  can be successfully grown as a multi-stemmed shrub in a container provided you are prepared to pot on at the recommended intervals and to supply it with sufficient water and food during the growing season.

Always keep pot-grown Eucalyptus in the air-pot container system for healthy and happy trees.😊  They do not thrive in smooth-walled containers 😒…the wall of death!

For information on how to successfully grow Eucs in pots, visit our Guidance Notes entitled ‘How to grow a Eucalyptus in a pot and keep it alive!’

Hedge-Screens: E. glaucescens is not on our selected species list for hedge-screens; although, there is no reason why a number of multi-stemmed bushes could not be grown in a line and pruned every March to keep them bushy. They will grow fast and tall.

Floral Art:  E. glaucescens produces excellent fragrant, cut foliage for Flower Farmers and floral art. The intermediate and adult foliage can be over-wintered and harvested late into the Spring, extending the season.

Firewood Production:  E. glaucescens ‘Guthega’ is great for growing biomass and firewood logs.

Do give us a call on our nursery mobile 07307 413 052 if you would like to discuss growing firewood with one of our consultants

 Rural/Agricultural:

• Good shade tree for livestock to stand under. Eucalyptus provide a cool environment for horses, cattle, llamas, sheep to shelter from the sun on hot days, as the mass evaporation of water through the leaves creates a cool shady canopy beneath. Good choice for silvopasture.
• Green foliaged species, which looks for comfortable and not ‘foreign’ in a rural setting – reminiscent of Willow Trees

Ecology:

• All Eucalyptus produce flowers with nectar and pollen, but this species has particularly prolific flowers making it a real draw for honey bees and other pollinators.
• Habitat creation and Game Cover: this species lends itself to providing good trouble-free habitat creation for wildlife and game cover, when planted in groups.  Birds enjoy roosting in Eucalyptus trees and Pheasants like rootling around underneath them.
• Chickens: The shredded foliage of glaucescens is excellent at keeping Chicken nest boxes and hen houses free of red mites, which detest the presence of Eucalyptol. I used to line our Chicken boxes with shredded leaves, strew the floor and pile up the spindly branches for the chickens to make nests. It was all great till the foxes moved into the next field 😒

 Environmental:

• Growing on the Coast There is precedence of glaucescens growing very successfully within sight of the sea in Cornwall

To make this work in such a windy environment, we recommend that:

1. you plant a smaller specimen (1 litre or 3 litre, around 1m-1.2m tall),
2. encourage fast establishment in a deeply prepared planting pit (follow our planting advice), to encourage deep rooting to grow an upright, stable tree.
3. Staking will be required.
4. Newly planted trees will very likely require a wind break shelter for their first winter in the ground with you.
5. Zero grass or weeds during the period of establishment is non-negotiable!

Shelter Belts and Windbreaks  E. glaucescens ‘Guthega’  can be grown to form a good evergreen windbreak when planted as a single species stand.  It can be mixed in with other plant species provided care is taken to mitigate competition from other plants, whilst the Eucalyptus is establishing as they don’t compete well when young. We recommend that you establish the Eucalyptus for a year prior to planting additional species or you install an automatic irrigation system to ensure the Euc is receiving sufficient water.

We recommend

• you plant a smaller specimen (less than 1.8m tall in a 1, 3 or 5 litre air-pot)
• encourage fast establishment in a deeply prepared planting pit (follow our planting advice), to encourage deep rooting to grow an upright, stable tree
• Staking will be required
• In exposed locations, newly planted trees will very likely require a wind break shelter for their first winter in the ground with you
• Zero grass or weeds during the period of establishment is non-negotiable!

Drying up wet soils E. glaucescens ‘Guthega’  is very at home in moist soils, such as a draining clay, draining peaty/loamy soils and draining sandy loams. It must be remembered that Eucalyptus are not aquatic like Mangrove, but several species, such as E. gunnii, E. aggregata and E. rodwayi, tolerate flooding for up to 6 months of the year in their native lands.

E. glaucescens ‘Guthega’  is a great species to help you regain the use of intermittently boggy ground. Dry up wet ground that intermittently lightly floods, gain remedial treatment for winter boggy ground or which suffers from outflow from a Septic tank system or unwanted intermittent seasonal ‘ponding’.

At Grafton, we have a 12m tall E. glaucescens  which is 12 years old. It was planted in an area that used to pond every winter, but the ground is now dry all year round.

If you have un-usable winter-wet land, planting a group of swamp gums, such as E aggregata or E. rodwayi, will help towards draining an area of ground. The timber could possibly be harvested to yield a crop of firewood logs too, if coppiced every 6-8 years.

• Please note: Timber harvested from areas suspected to be contaminated with sewage should never be burned, but could be used in rustic garden construction, bug hotel, bean poles, edging pathways & borders etc.

Sustainable Drainage Systems aka SUDS: Needs trialling, but planted singly or in groups, E. glaucescens ‘Guthega’  will most likely draw on drain water percolating into swales or similar. Coppice or pollard every few years if you need to control the overall height of the trees. Eucalyptus draw on ground water for twelve months of the year, unlike willows, which lie dormant for 5 months through the winter.

Eucalypts grown on continually wet ground The overall height of Eucalypts, grown on continually wet soils in inhabited areas, needs to be considered (as with any tree species of great height), especially in areas subject to strong gales.  Selecting your tree with a radial root-system is vital and therefore only use Air-Pot grown or air-root-pruned stock.  Eucalypts grown in smooth-walled pots are a ticking-time-bomb liability and we can speak from personal experience.  Encouraging deep rooting by following our planting recommendations is essential. In addition, it may be prudent to consider pollarding or coppicing after 8 years of growth, to control the height down to around 10m, to mitigate the risk of the trees being forced over in high winds. Once coppiced/pollarded, it is recommended to maintain overall height at 10m or less thereafter. This practice usually only needs carrying out once every 8 years or so.

Tolerant of cold and exposed growing environments inland E. glaucescens ‘Guthega’ will grow in open fields and pasture, once established.

We recommend

• you plant a smaller specimen (less than 1.8m tall in a 3 or 5 litre air-pot)
• encourage fast establishment in a deeply prepared planting pit (follow our planting advice), to encourage deep rooting to grow an upright, stable tree
• Staking will be required
• In exposed locations, newly planted trees will very likely require a wind break shelter made from horticultural fleece or sail cloth, for their first winter in the ground with you; this very much depends on the level of exposure
• Zero grass or weeds during the period of establishment is non-negotiable!

Tolerant of poor stony soils once established E.glaucescens ‘Guthega’ does not require a rich soil and can survive in poor, stony soils.   Tolerant of arid environments, poor stony dry soils once established. It is essential that your Euc. is given our recommended quantity of water for its first 2 growing seasons in your grounds, during its establishment phase before you abandon it to its fate.

The tree needs to establish a good, deep root system before it can survive in dry, challenging conditions. No grass, no weeds and a thick bark chip mulch, to a depth of 150 mm (6 inches) are essential to assist with good establishment. Growth on impoverished soils will always be reduced. E. glaucescens will always grow better on a good quality soil.