Home / Browse / Eucalyptus / Gray Ironbark

iNaturalist — CC, credited & licensed per image

Myrtaceae family

Gray Ironbark Eucalyptus paniculata

Gray Ironbark is an introduced perennial tree, found in Hawaii. It grows to 65 ft.

More about this plant

Eucalyptus paniculata, commonly known as grey ironbark, is a species of tree that is endemic to New South Wales. It has dark-coloured, deeply furrowed ironbark on the trunk and branches, lance-shaped to curved adult leaves, flower buds in groups of seven on a branched peduncle, white flowers and conical, hemispherical or cup-shaped fruit. Wikipedia →

Growing & care

USDA PLANTS · TRY

Size & form

Sources · Size & form

TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0) — Height · Foliage

USDA PLANTS — Lifespan

Height: 65 ft
Lifespan: Perennial
Foliage: Evergreen broadleaf

In the garden

Canopy layer — Sits in the canopy of a layered food forest or polyculture.Open guide →

derived roles

Species characteristics from USDA PLANTS (public domain) + TRY (CC BY) — general guidance, not a guarantee for your exact site. Deer "browsing" is documented palatability, not a deer-proof claim.

Wildlife & pollinators

How pollinator value is scored →

❧ Caterpillar hosts Documented caterpillar host

Recorded feeding on Eucalyptus in North America, including:

Arachnis picta · Painted Tiger Moth Argyrotaenia citrana · leafroller moth Certima dositheata · geometer (inchworm) moth

Crocidosema plebejana · leafroller moth

Manduca sexta · Carolina Sphinx

Phryganidia californica · California Oak Moth

+ 3 more species →

Sabulodes aegrotata · geometer (inchworm) moth Sabulodes caberata · geometer (inchworm) moth

Xylophanes tersa · Tersa Sphinx

Named species (a documented Nearctic sample, not exhaustive) from NHM HOSTS (CC0).

✦ Bees 1 bee visitor

1 native & managed bee species is documented visiting Gray Ironbark :

Apis mellifera · Honey Bee

Visitor records (observations, not exhaustive) from Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI →

Wildlife & visitors 2 birds

Open records of who else uses Gray Ironbark — a generalist food-web signal, kept separate from the keystone Ecological Value.

Recorded eaten by 2 birds species (fruit, seed, browse):

Callocephalon fimbriatum · Gang-Gang Cockatoo

Trichoglossus moluccanus · Rainbow Lorikeet

Interaction records (observations, not exhaustive) from GloBI → (CC0). Counts are distinct species; names are the most-recorded. Common names from Wikidata (CC0).

Species thumbnails re-hosted from iNaturalist — Creative Commons, credited per image (hover for credit). Click any species to see it on iNaturalist. Not exhaustive; many taxa have no openly-licensed photo yet.

How we know this (2) Methods & honest limits

Leaf build Direct fact

We read each species’ measured specific leaf area (leaf area per unit dry weight) from the Global Spectrum dataset and band it: thin & fast (high SLA), medium, or thick & tough (low SLA). The global median is about 10 mm²/mg.

Honest limits: A species-mean from pooled measurements — individual plants vary with light and site. A broad strategy signal, not a precise per-plant figure.

Díaz, S. et al. (2022) The global spectrum of plant form and function: enhanced species-level trait dataset. Scientific Data 9:755.

Photosynthesis Direct fact

A recorded categorical fact: each species is tagged C3 (standard), C4 (heat/water-efficient) or CAM (succulent, night-time CO₂ uptake) — or a facultative combination. We only show a trait card for the noteworthy C4/CAM cases; C3 is the unremarkable majority, kept in the data but not surfaced as a card.

Kattge, J. et al. TRY plant trait database — Categorical Traits Dataset (2012).

Derived values are computed from open data by a published method — labelled, cited, and never shown as a direct observation. Full methodology →

Sources for this entry (19) Open & cited

[01] Scientific name & family — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)

[02] Growth habit & duration — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)

[03] Native status & distribution — USDA PLANTS (DwCA, Zenodo 17903503)

[04] Common name — USDA PLANTS (via GBIF)

[05] Invasive / introduced status — US-RIIS v2.0 (USGS)

[06] Photos — iNaturalist — CC, credited per image

[07] Description — Wikipedia (CC BY-SA)

[08] Ecological value — GloBI

[09] Foliage — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[10] Height — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[11] Functional traits — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[12] Photosynthetic pathway — TRY Plant Trait Database (CC BY 4.0)

[13] Wildlife & visitors — GloBI — Global Biotic Interactions (CC0)

[14] Mycorrhiza — FungalRoot v2.0 · Meng et al. 2024 (Dryad, CC0)

[15] Human uses — Dr. Duke's Phytochemical & Ethnobotanical Databases (USDA, CC0)

[16] Bee visitors — Noori et al. 2026 (Zenodo, CC BY 4.0) · via GloBI

[17] Flower-visitor value (derived) — Noori et al. 2026 (CC BY 4.0) · GloBI

[18] Caterpillar species — NHM HOSTS (CC0)

[19] County range — GBIF Open Data — open-licensed occurrences (CC0/CC-BY) → county

Spot an error or have a better photo? Every field links to its source, and the whole dataset is open.

Cite this page Open data, please attribute

PlantKey’s data is open under CC BY-SA 4.0 — free to reuse and adapt, with attribution and the same licence. Photos keep their own per-image licence + credit (see Sources above).

Citation

Loading…

BibTeX

Loading…

Enable JavaScript for a ready-to-copy citation with today’s access date, or cite this page’s URL with the date you viewed it.

Ecological value open data

3 / 5 Keystone

Keystone (host) value — caterpillar, specialist-bee & monarch hosting. A low number means “not a keystone host,” not “low value”: generalist flower-visitor value is shown separately below and in Bees & wildlife.

Caterpillar host 5

Flower-visitor value derived 1

Recorded flower-visitor breadth — observations, not a nectar measurement. open data

⚠ non-native — reduced keystone value

Deep dive

Caterpillar host · 5/5 — native butterfly & moth caterpillars that feed on this genus — the base of the food web (more caterpillars → more songbirds). Genus-level keystone count from Warren II 2026 (CC0; Tallamy host-use records), gap-filled by our GloBI derivation.

Counts are genus-level and banded 0–5. Full rubric →

Host / keystone value from open interaction data. How this is scored →

📍 In your area live

Introduced to the U.S.

Recorded in 1 state.

Open occurrence records place it in 1 counties across 1 states · GBIF (CC0/CC-BY)

Introduced — Hawaii

Recorded in 1 states/territories

Conservation

Invasive? Introduced

Toxicity & pet safety

Check the ASPCA pet database →

Educational, not veterinary advice. If you suspect your pet ate this plant, contact a vet or pet poison-control line.

Documented human uses Dr. Duke's

Medicinal use

A historical record of how this plant has been used — not medical or dietary advice, and not a claim that it is effective or safe. Many plants are toxic; never ingest or treat with a wild plant without expert guidance and a confirmed identification. Dr. Duke's →

Functional traits TRY · Dryad

Wood density very high

0.93 g/cm³

dense, durable wood — good firewood / charcoal & long-lasting coppice or hügel material

Seed mass small

1 mg

small seed — straightforward to sow

Leaf nitrogen low

10.7 mg/g

leaf nitrogen — a rough guide to compost/mulch value

Leaf build medium

Medium

mid-range leaf build (measured leaf area per weight 8.9 mm²/mg)

Leaf size medium

Medium

mid-sized leaves (measured leaf area ~27 cm²)

Mycorrhiza obligate

Ecto (ECM)

ectomycorrhizal — the partnership of most forest trees; wraps roots in a fungal sheath and links into shared soil networks

Deep dive — what these mean

Wood density 0.93 g/cm³ — how heavy the wood is for its size. Denser wood = hotter, longer-burning firewood and tougher poles; lighter wood rots fast (quick mulch).

Seed mass 1 mg — average weight of one seed. Bigger seeds are easier to hand-collect & direct-sow; dust-fine seeds need surface-sowing.

Leaf nitrogen 10.7 mg/g — measured leaf N. Higher = richer prunings for compost/mulch (a measured stand-in for "dynamic accumulator" claims).

Leaf build — how thick & tough the leaves are. Thin, lightweight leaves grow fast and crave light; thick, tough leaves last longer and shrug off shade, drought & grazing. (measured leaf area per dry weight, 8.9 mm²/mg)

Photosynthesis — the standard “C3” pathway most plants use, most active in cooler, moister, moderate-light conditions. (pathway C3)

Mycorrhiza ECM — the root–fungus partnership it forms (AM = most plants; ECM = most forest trees; ERM = heaths; NM = none). Trades sugars for water & nutrients via shared soil networks.

Measured traits from TRY + Werner et al. (N-fix), Fan et al. (roots) & FungalRoot — general guidance, not species-specific prescriptions.

More modules coming

Gray Ironbark Eucalyptus paniculata

Growing & care

Wildlife & pollinators

Related plants