Plants of South Eastern New South Wales
Schefflera actinophylla
Common name
Umbrella tree
Family
Araliaceae
Where found
Forest, woodland, near habitations, coastal environs, and along streams. Coast and ranges north of Kiama.
Native to central and north Queensland.
Notes
Introduced tree, usually multistemmed, or shrub, to 20 m high. Sometimes germinating on other trees and growing as an epiphyte until its roots reach the ground. Fruit fleshy. Bark relatively smooth, scaly, with conspicuous leaf-scars when young. Stems hairless, covered with lenticels. Leaves alternating up the stems, compound, usually with 7–16 leaflets, each usually 8–30 cm long, 400–800 mm wide, tips pointed, margins entire, surfaces dark green, hairless, leathery. Leaflet stalks 2.5-12 cm long. Saplings often with leaves with only 3 much smaller leaflets. Flowers bisexual, or male and female flowers on the same plant. Flowers pink to red outside, white inside, with 7–18 petals each 3–5 mm long. Flowers in headlike clusters 10–20 mm in diameter along a rachis to 80 cm long. Fruit dark red to purple, round, 6-12 mm in diameter.
General Biosecurity Duty all NSW. Many areas of native vegetation are protected in Australia. Always check native vegetation requirements before undertaking control of a weedy native plant.
PlantNET description: http://plantnet.rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au/cgi-bin/NSWfl.pl?page=nswfl&lvl=sp&name=Schefflera~actinophylla (accessed 6 February, 2021)
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