Black 'wattle' daubed with stipules

I'm surprised I haven't featured this plant before, although I have mentioned it in passing a few times. I'm also struggling to think of a Christmas link to this plant, given that cultural event looms large.

Black Wattle, as they call it in New South Wales, is not an Acacia, or anything related to the other wattles in Australia. It's botanical name is Callicoma serratifolia, in the family Cunoniaceae.

The flower heads look like those of a true wattle although the pod is a cluster of small capsules rather than a 'pea pod'. It's said that in addition to this floral similarity, its use in early 'wattle and daubing' of settler homes led to its common name. 

The Black Wattle, or Silver-leaf Butterwood, grows alongside creeks and similar habitats in rainforests of New South Wales and Queensland. I used to kayak past some in the upper reaches of Middle Harbour, on the North Shore of Sydney. Its flowering is one of my sprummer (October and November) season indicators. 

The plants photographed here are in the Gondwana Garden of the Australian Garden at Royal Botanic Gardens Cranbourne. They are only a few years old but enjoying this crowded habitat.

I'm not sure why it is not more widely grown in cultivation. The shiny leaves with softly hairy undersurface, and the lightly lemon-coloured pom-pom flowers are attractive. 

Maybe because it is neither a fine specimen tree nor a low shrub - poor old tall shrubs and ungainly trees are often overlooked in garden design.

As I've mentioned before, the Cunoniaceae, is a mostly Southern Hemisphere family and mostly from the tropics and subtropics. They often have stipules, small leaf-like appendages at the base of the leaf stalk. 

In the Black Wattle, those stipules triangular in shape, between the paired leaves. You can see them in young growth (as above) but they soon fall off. The fact that Black Wattle has true leaves, rather than the flattened leaf stalk we call a phyllode, also helps you to distinguish this from most Australian Acacia species.  

As for Christmas, should you be one who celebrates it, you may find a few trees still in flower on 25 December. And if not, look out for the New South Wales Christmas Bush (Ceratopetalum gummiferum), also a member of the family Cunoniaceae. 

While it also flowers in sprummer, the fruits are brightly and festively red in colour. Have a look to see if you can find evidence of the stipules - they are again transient, so in older growth, look for the scar.