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Eucalyptus cinerea (Silver Dollar Tree) - This is a fast-growing medium-sized evergreen tree grows to 25 to 40 feet tall by 20 to 30 feet wide, usually with a crooked or curved trunk with fibrous and furrowed reddish brown bark and a dense full crown. Its juvenile leaves are pairs of oval, silvery-powder colored leaves on white stems that mature to be more lanceolate shaped held alternatively along the stem - this tree continues to hold both juvenile and mature leaves. White flowers bloom near the stems in the winter through spring.
Plant in a fairly well-drained soil where it does well in the full sun and is wind, drought and salt tolerant. It is hardy to 15 to 20 degrees F. A very attractive mid-sized tree.
Eucalyptus cinerea is endemic to south-eastern Australia. The name for the genus comes from the Greek words 'eu' meaning "well" and 'kalypto' meaning 'to cover' as with a lid and an allusion to the united calyx-lobes and petals that is called an operculum that forms a lid or cap that is shed when the flowers open. The specific epithet is a Latin word meaning "ash-colored" or "grey" in reference to the white, waxy bloom on the leaves flower buds and fruit. Argyle Apple is the common name that has been used in Australia since 1867, referring to Argyle County in New South Wales, which was named in 1820 by Lachlan Macquarie, then governor of New South Wales, after his native county in Scotland. In Australia it is also often called Long-leaved Argyle Apple and Silver Stingybark but in California it is more often called Silver Dollar Tree for its rounded silver-colored juvenile leaves.
Curiously, this plant was not introduced into cultivation in the US from seed sent from Australia but was first introduced by the Bureau of Plant Industry (USDA) as BPI#101065 from seed presented to the chief of the Bureau of Introduction by the government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics in Leningrad on August 29, 1932. Young plants were listed as growing in Montecito in Maunsell Van Rensselaer's 1948 Trees of Santa Barbara but were absent in his edition written eight years prior so it seems its introduction to the area was sometime in the 1940s.. We grew this attractive Eucalyptus on and off since the nursery first opened in 1979 and thank Cal Poly San Luis Obispo botanist Dr. Matt Ritter for encouraging us to grow it again most recently by providing us seedlings that were grown at the campus nursery.
This information about Eucalyptus cinerea displayed is based on research conducted in our horticultural library and from reliable online resources. We also will relate observations made about it as it grows in our nursery gardens and other gardens we have visited, as well how the crops have performed in containers in our nursery field. We will also incorporate comments that we receive from others and we welcome hearing from anyone with additional information, particularly if they can share any cultural information that would aid others in growing it.
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