About Eucalyptus melliodora A.Cunn. ex Schauer
Eucalyptus melliodora A.Cunn. ex Schauer, commonly known as yellow box, is a tree that typically grows to 30 metres (98 feet) in height and forms a lignotuber. Its bark is variable in form: it can be mostly smooth with an irregular short patch of rough bark at the base of the trunk, or most of the trunk can be covered in fibrous, dense or loosely held bark in grey, yellow or red-brown colours. Occasionally the bark is very coarse, thick, and coloured dark brown to black. Smooth bark on upper sections of the tree is shed from upper limbs, leaving a smooth white or yellowish surface. Young plants and coppice regrowth have lance-shaped to elliptic leaves that are 25–65 mm (0.98–2.56 in) long, 9–35 mm (0.35–1.38 in) wide, and borne on a petiole. Adult leaves are dull light green or slate grey, matching in colour on both surfaces, with a lance-shaped to egg-shaped form. They measure 60–140 mm (2.4–5.5 in) long, 8–30 mm (0.31–1.18 in) wide, and are borne on an 8–20 mm (0.31–0.79 in) long petiole. For both adult and juvenile leaves, the marginal vein is noticeably distant from the leaf edge. Flower buds are arranged in groups of seven on an unbranched peduncle 3–10 mm (0.12–0.39 in) long, with individual buds attached to 2–10 mm (0.079–0.394 in) long pedicels. Mature buds are club-shaped, oval, or diamond-shaped, 4–8 mm (0.16–0.31 in) long and 3–5 mm (0.12–0.20 in) wide, with a conical to rounded operculum. Flowering has been recorded in most months of the year, and the flowers are white. The fruit is a woody hemispherical to shortened spherical capsule 3–8 mm (0.12–0.31 in) long and 3–7 mm (0.12–0.28 in) wide, with its valves positioned near or below the capsule rim. Yellow box is widely distributed across the eastern plains and tablelands from western Victoria, New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory, north to south-central Queensland. It grows in association with a range of other plant species: inland grey box, Eucalyptus conica (fuzzy box), Eucalyptus albens (white box), Eucalyptus pilligaensis (pilliga grey box), Eucalyptus sideroxylon (red ironbark), Eucalyptus crebra (narrow-leaved ironbark), Eucalyptus blakelyi (Blakely's red gum), Angophora (apple species), Callitris endlicheri (black cypress), Callitris glaucophylla (white cypress), Brachychiton populneus (kurrajong), and Acacia (wattle) species. Eucalyptus melliodora provides good firewood, as well as hard, strong, durable timber. Honey produced from the nectar of this species is well known for its high quality.
