AusBonsai

So there are an abundance of these where I live in Sydney, I think they are allocasuarina but thought I would check.















They throw out plenty of little ones that get constantly mowed down by the council.
They are all around my area (Balmain)

Was thinking of collecting some before the mower comes out but I was reading that some people have been unsuccessful collecting these - if my ID is correct

Also saw one other type, which had a natural semi cascade to it! Black Sheoak or drooping maybe?







It has thinner foliage than the others and softer as below:




Is it worth trying to collect any of the smaller ones?


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I assume that is council property. You'll be up for a horrendous fine. Avoid.

Take a trip to your local council nursery. If you're in Sydney, try Plants Plus at Castle Hill. They have an awesome selection of Casuarina.
They range in price from about $3 - $20 depending on the size you want. They have a lot of variety and it will have a better root system, it will survive, and will be a lot cheaper than a $10k fine.

Haha thanks Rory,
I was tempted to check out bonsai south for some small stock after seeing Steven and your posts on these. Truly impressive


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The small ones everywhere will probably be from suckers where the roots have been damaged by the mower. Very common occurrence.

Rustyck wrote:Haha thanks Rory,
I was tempted to check out bonsai south for some small stock after seeing Steven and your posts on these. Truly impressive


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hahahah, I cleaned them out years ago my friend. They had good stock of torulosa. Ironically I gave away most of them about a year ago too
They may have started new casys but I doubt it - Many years ago Leon said he was not starting any more. At the time there wasn't much interest from casys I presume to warrant them. Now I would hope its a different issue. Bonsai World up on the central coast in Jilliby has a tonne of littoralis, 8 inch pots. Plants Plus will be a lot closer to you and last time I was there they had some very thick trunk stock. If you do a major trunk chop though on thick stock, hold off till about November. And be careful doing it on Torulosa/littoralis. Try to cut above the green, and do it in stages over years. I would actually always recommend to people to instead purchase thinner trunks where you can get your finer into the soil, as they will thicken really quickly if you ground grow them anyway, but on thinner stock the roots will be easier to fix in the long term.

As Dansai quite rightly points out, often suckers like these close to the parent are root suckers and useless for collecting.

I have found that they also grow readily from seed (at least the ones I have collected down south) and they do grow quite quickly as Rory mentioned above if you give them room. If you can find trees that have woody "cones", collect a couple and put them in a paper bag until they drop their seeds, assuming you can beat the parrots.

Hi Rory,
I'm curious why you say "often suckers like these close to the parent are root suckers and useless for collecting." Last May I dug a piece of Casuarina root with a couple of small trees growing from it, thinking they had grown from seed. Since then they have grown well in the pot I planted them in. I will be keeping them as a pair, and am bending them to eventually make a windswept style pair of trees, sort of like a small raft.
Cheers, Frank.

Raging Bull wrote:Hi Rory,
I'm curious why you say "often suckers like these close to the parent are root suckers and useless for collecting." Last May I dug a piece of Casuarina root with a couple of small trees growing from it, thinking they had grown from seed. Since then they have grown well in the pot I planted them in. I will be keeping them as a pair, and am bending them to eventually make a windswept style pair of trees, sort of like a small raft.
Cheers, Frank.

If the suckers you took had roots that's great, but I mean if there are suckers with no root themselves then your chances aren't the best. You would essentially have as much luck just cutting off a limb and sticking it in the ground if there aren't any roots.

Quite a few times I have attempted to dig beautiful stunted casys. After digging and digging, it becomes apparent its just one long sucker with no feeder roots attached to a nearby parent.

I have included this highly detailed and artistic interpretation of what I am referring to.

"I have included this highly detailed and artistic interpretation of what I am referring to. I like it, I like it!!