Ginkgo biloba L. 

Scientific name: Ginkgo biloba L. 

Author: Linnaeus

Common name: Ginkgo [from the Chinese yin-kuo, silver apricot].

Family: Ginkgoaceae

Location

Admire the specimen opposite the Visitor Centre entrance or wonder below the Residence Garden lawn and enjoy the plantings near the weather station. Seek out our largest ginkgo below the Brunet Pavilion, planted for posterity by ‘The General’, or contemplate the very compact, cv. Fastigiata, specimen in the Conifer Cultivar Garden.

The nuts of the ‘silver apricots’, which form on the female trees, are eaten in China and Japan. However, the rancid butter smell and falling fruit do not appeal in the West so the male trees are more often grown. There is a female tree in Bed 17 of the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney. Resistance to pollution and disease and the brief but beautiful autumn display when the butter coloured leaves clothe the trees like a million migrating butterflies endear the ginko as a superlative ornamental plant.

The ginko has much to tell us about long-term survival as the fossil record, back to the Permian Period 275-245 million years ago, contains specimens with a remarkably close resemblance to the present day trees.

Be sure to see the variety of sasanqua camellias, the proteas, the Japanese maples, the bright yellow spikes of the Mahonia near the Residence, the blue haze of the Ceratostigma below the Residence lawn, and to pause awhile in the Residence Garden and smell the violets.