Boabs in Central West Qld

They are native to central Australia and South Africa and by some coinsidence the story told by the native/indiginous people of both countries is very similar, as in the gods thought they were ugly so they pulled them out and stuck them back in the ground upside down.

History is a wonderfull thing eh!!

Baz.

I wondered the same thing when travelling through that area.

Turns out that they are a different tree althogether although they do look very similar. I forget the name, locally they are just called bottle trees, which boabs are too. Just to add more to the confusion.

I found the answer in my treebook I carry in the car.

From this web site:
Site Link

Boab (Adansonia gregorii)
Boabs can only be found within the Kimberley region of Western Australia. It is found within rocky areas and has a very distinctive look. Its thick trunk holds root like branches sprouting from the top. It’s real roots stay underground and can spread a distance of about 23 metres across. Boabs are relatively small in comparison to other trees found around Australia, with their height reaching upto about 20 metres

I thought if I found it on the web, it had to be true!!!

This from the National Museum of Australia web site:

Boab trees are indigenous to the Kimberley region. Local Aboriginal people use Boab nuts as decorative ornaments by scratching scenes into the nut's surface. Traditionally Aboriginal people have used various parts of the tree for food, medicine, water supply, fibre, glue and shelter.

It doesn't say they are not indigenous to any other area of course, but the suggestion is they are originally from the Kimberley only.

Curiouser and curiouser

Bottle Tree's here are also known as Kurrajong's, you can eat the little nuts they produce too in a woody pod surrounded by furry stuff that tickles your throat if you don't get it off the seeds before you eat them

Boab's are Boab's, Qld have Bottle trees not Boab's

www.grasstree.com/bottletree.htm

Boab trees (Adansonia gregorii ) are distinctive features of the Kimberley region of Western Australia (left). They are also found in northwest Northern Territory. The immense, swollen trunks on older trees can measure over 15m around. Radio-carbon dating of a related species in Africa indicated an age of 1000 years. Given their slow growth rate and the immense size of some trunks, large Australian boabs are also likely to be very old. The large white flowers, which are pollinated by hawkmoths, appear on the spreading branches of the tree when it has dropped its leaves. The name boab is a shortened version of the African `baobab´.


Boabs are a puzzle. In spite of their trunk shapes, they are not related to Australian `bottle trees´ (Brachychiton sp.). Their closest rellies are six species in Madagascar and one on the African mainland. It has been suggested that seeds, or even entire trees, arrived in Australian after floating across the Indian Ocean, but this theory runs into trouble because there are no closely related species in Madagascar, unless they have since become extinct. Alternatively, these trees may have been in Australia since before the break-up of Gondwana. If that is the case, however, why have they not spread further, since they are well adapted to drought conditions? Possibly the superior root systems of eucalypts have given them a competitive edge. Fire, however, may play a part. Studies have shown that although young boabs can resprout successfully from the roots after a fire, they bear very few fruits. On the other hand, in areas where overgrazing has led to a reduction of fires, boabs are spreading rapidly.

Damn.....i thought the subject heading was spelt wrong :-(

Andrew

As someone has said the trees that look like boabs are infact bottle trees. A guy at Roma told me all about them but that was 2 years ago & there is a big mother of a Bottle tree there....You can buy them in the garden centre at Roma though the one I bought was confiscated by some oversealous plant quarantine officers at Renmark on my way home... Probably would'nt have lived in Canberra anyway....

We have a bottle tree in our back yard. Has been there for about 30 or so years. Great tree to look out and yes does look a litlel like the boab tree - in fact when in the back yard it reminds me of the trips to both WA and the the driving in outback Queensland.
Jenkie