Eucalyptus nitida – the Shining or Smithton Peppermint
How to use in the landscape and/or garden: How to grow or train it to get the best out of it
Fabulous Specimen Tree for the wider landscape, arboretum collection or avenue planting and for the medium and larger garden.
Commercially: a good choice for open public spaces, parks, business parks, university campus
For the smaller garden: grow as a bushy shrub
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 18th 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 18th 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 July, but no later. Don’t prune from August through to February. We have no direct experience of growing E nitida as shrub-on-a-stick, but we don’t see why it shouldn’t be possible.
Growing a multi-stemmed bush or tree.
We offer E. nitida in bush form so you can grow it as a bushy shrub.
If you are starting with a standard tree, E nitida responds well to coppicing and readily produces a multi-stemmed specimen responds well to coppicing, once it has attained a trunk of some 125 mm in diameter and readily produces a multi-stemmed specimen
Why would you want to grow as a bushy shrub?
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. xxx 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 ☹
For information on how to successfully grow Eucs in pots, visit our Blog entitled ‘How to grow a Eucalyptus in a pot and keep it alive!’
Summer Patio then Winter Conservatory; a tender species: if you are growing in a cold or exposed location, you may want to overwinter your Smithton Peppermint in an unheated greenhouse. Then re-pot in the Spring and put outside for the summer months.
Floral Art: E. nitida produces excellent cut foliage for Flower Farmers and floral art, for those growing in a sheltered, sunny location with free-draining soil.
Firewood Production: E. nitida is not on our selected species list for Biomass or Firewood.
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
Ecology:
- All Eucalyptus produce flowers with nectar and pollen, but this species has particularly spectacular flowers making it a real draw for honey bees and other pollinators.
- Chickens: The shredded foliage of nitida 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 L
Environmental:
- Growing on the Coast nitida is an excellent performer under coastal conditions. To make this work, we recommend that:
- you plant a smaller specimen (5 litre bush or standard at around 1m-1.2m tall),
- 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.
- 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!
Do get in touch if you are giving this a go and let us know how you get on.
Tolerant of poor stony soils once established nitida does not require a rich soil and can survive in poor, stony soils. Tolerant of arid environments, poor sandy or 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.
