The trees growing in the streets and parks of Victoria Park are mapped on the Town’s Intramaps site. Unfortunately, this does not include trees in bushland, such as the Kensington Bushland and Hillview Tce Reserve.
The 2018 Kensington Bushland Management Plan identified 5 trees in the Kent Street sandpit, 6 trees in George Street Reserve and 82 trees in Harold Rossiter Reserve as being suitable habitat for Black Cockatoos. Many of these are introduced species.
An analysis of all trees on the Intramaps site in these areas was undertaken by Robert Audcent identifying 501 trees across 38 species. Of those, 340 trees were on the Harold Rossiter Reserve. A copy of his spreadsheet is available from Friends on request.
Only one tree in the area is categorized by the Town as significant, the Eucalyptus todiana, the Pricklybark, along Baron-Hay Court towards the Kent Street end.
Estimating the age of mature trees is challenging. A 2014 paper by the then Department of Parks and Wildlife, provided a formula for estimating the ages of Jarrah and Marri, noting several caveats including the impact of watering on trees in parks and the increasing unreliabilty of the formula as trees age. Nonetheless, an estimation can be made using the following algorithm:
- Measure the circumference in centimetres of the tree at breast height, about 1.3m.
- Divide by 3.17
- Multiply the result by 2.35 and add 6.97.
The result is the approximate age of the tree in years.
