Corymbia maculata commonly known as Spotted Gum, is an endemic Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

n tree.

Description

Spotted Gum is a medium to tall tree with a straight trunk, growing up to 70 metres in height. However, there is an old reference to a 91 metre tall tree. Spotted Gum has smooth bark which is white, grey or pink; often with characteristic patches ("spots"). The bark is shed in irregularly-shaped flakes.

The juvenile leaves are glossy green and elliptic to ovate, while the adult leaves are lanceolate and are 10 to 20 cm long and 1.5 to 3 cm wide.

It has small, white flowers occur from winter to spring followed by ovoid or slightly urceolate

Urceolate

Urceolate literally means "shaped like an urn or pitcher", with a swollen middle and narrowing top. It is often used in botany to describe a feature of plant morphology. Examples of urceolate plant structures are the pitchers of many species of the pitcher plant genera Sarracenia and Nepenthes....

 fruits, which are 10 to 14 mm long and 9 to 11 mm wide.

Taxonomy

The species was first formally described by William Jackson Hooker

William Jackson Hooker

Sir William Jackson Hooker, FRS was an English systematic botanist and organiser. He held the post of Regius Professor of Botany at Glasgow University, and was the first Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He enjoyed the friendship and support of Sir Joseph Banks for his exploring,...

 in 1844, and given the name Eucalyptus maculata. The specific name maculata is derived from the Latin

Latin

Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...

 word maculosus, meaning "spotted" (referring to the spotted pattern on the irregularly-shed bark). The species was transferred to the genus Corymbia

Corymbia

Corymbia is a genus of about 113 species of tree that were classified as Eucalyptus species until the mid-1990s. It includes the bloodwoods, ghost gums and spotted gums. The bloodwoods had been recognised as a distinct group within the large and diverse Eucalyptus genus since 1867...

by K.D.Hill & L.A.S.Johnson in 1995.

A number of natural hybrids between Corymbia maculata and other Corymbia species have been identified as follows:

• × C. citriodora - known as "C. variegata", occurs in New South Wales
• × C. gummifera
  Corymbia gummifera
  Corymbia gummifera, commonly known as Red Bloodwood, is a hardwood tree native to eastern Australia.-Description:It usually grows as a tree, but may take the form of a mallee in very poor soils. As a tree it typically grows to a height of 20 to 34 metres and a trunk diameter of one metre dbh....
  
  - known as Eucalyptus x nowraensis, occurs in southern New South Wales
• × C. intermedia
  Corymbia intermedia
  Corymbia intermedia or the pink bloodwood is a bloodwood native to Queensland and New South Wales...
  
  - occurs in New South Wales

Distribution

Corymbia maculata is a dominant species of open forest in Queensland

Queensland

Queensland is a state of Australia, occupying the north-eastern section of the mainland continent. It is bordered by the Northern Territory, South Australia and New South Wales to the west, south-west and south respectively. To the east, Queensland is bordered by the Coral Sea and Pacific Ocean...

, New South Wales

New South Wales

New South Wales is a state of :Australia, located in the east of the country. It is bordered by Queensland, Victoria and South Australia to the north, south and west respectively. To the east, the state is bordered by the Tasman Sea, which forms part of the Pacific Ocean. New South Wales...

 and Victoria

Victoria (Australia)

Victoria is the second most populous state in Australia. Geographically the smallest mainland state, Victoria is bordered by New South Wales, South Australia, and Tasmania on Boundary Islet to the north, west and south respectively....

. It occurs on infertile and dry sites and is associated with the presence of shale

Shale

Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock composed of mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals and tiny fragments of other minerals, especially quartz and calcite. The ratio of clay to other minerals is variable. Shale is characterized by breaks along thin laminae or parallel layering...

s and slate

Slate

Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. The result is a foliated rock in which the foliation may not correspond to the original sedimentary layering...

s.

The species is naturalised in Western Australia

Western Australia

Western Australia is a state of Australia, occupying the entire western third of the Australian continent. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Great Australian Bight and Indian Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east and South Australia to the south-east...

 and South Australia

South Australia

South Australia is a state of Australia in the southern central part of the country. It covers some of the most arid parts of the continent; with a total land area of , it is the fourth largest of Australia's six states and two territories.South Australia shares borders with all of the mainland...

, and in areas of New South Wales and Victoria outside its natural range.

Cultivation

The species is often used for planting in parks and as a street tree, however its mature size makes it unsuitable for most home gardens.