H2 Hinde Tree facts for kids

Quick facts for kids H2 Hinde Tree
H2 Hinde Tree, 2008
Location	Colliston, 926 Gilston Road, Gilston, City of Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia
Queensland Heritage Register
Official name: The H2 HINDE TREE (Macadamia integrifolia) on Colliston
Type	state heritage
Designated	14 August 2008
Reference no.	602649
Significant period	1960s onwards
Significant components	trees of social, historic or special significance
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The H2 Hinde Tree is a very special tree in Queensland, Australia. It's a type of macadamia tree called Macadamia integrifolia. This tree is so important that it's listed on the Queensland Heritage Register. This means it's protected because of its history and value. It is located on a former farm called Colliston.

The H2 Hinde Tree's Story

The H2 Hinde tree grows on Colliston, which used to be a farm. It's about nine kilometers southwest of Nerang. This tree is the "parent" of a special type of macadamia nut. It was likely planted in the 1920s.

In 1960, the Queensland Department of Agriculture officially registered it. For the next 20 years, many macadamia farms used parts of this tree to grow new trees. It was one of only two Australian macadamia types to become so popular.

What is a Parent Tree?

In farming, a "parent tree" is a unique plant chosen for its good qualities. For macadamias, this means strong growth and tasty nuts. It also means fewer pests and diseases.

How New Trees are Grown

Farmers often use a method called "grafting" to grow new trees. This means taking a branch or bud from a parent tree (called "scion wood"). This piece is then attached to the roots or stem of another tree. This way, the new tree will grow the same type of nuts as the parent.

Grafting is the fastest and most reliable way to grow macadamia trees for selling. Growing them from seeds doesn't always work as well.

The Hinde Family Farm

Michael James Hinde started the Colliston farm in 1879. This was when new land was opening up near the Nerang River. In 1882, he married Alice Batten.

Family stories say that Michael found some native macadamia seedlings. He replanted them on his farm, Colliston. He was a small-scale farmer and worked hard to support his large family. He tried growing many different crops. These included maize, arrowroot, and later, oranges. He also had a small dairy farm.

When times were tough, he would gather wild fruits. He also fished in the river and hunted birds. He even planted a vineyard and kept bees. After he passed away in 1937, his oldest son took over the farm.

Macadamia Trees on Colliston

Around the 1920s, Michael Hinde's orange trees started to get old. So, he began planting macadamia trees between them. He used parts from the native trees he had planted earlier.

Macadamia trees belong to a plant family called Proteaceae. There are different types of macadamia trees. The ones with edible nuts are found in the coastal rainforests of Queensland and New South Wales.

Discovering Macadamia Nuts

There's some debate about who first found macadamia trees in the wild. But everyone agrees that Dr. Ferdinand von Mueller and Walter Hill rediscovered them in 1857. Walter Hill was in charge of the Brisbane Botanic Gardens.

Walter Hill later found by accident that one type of tree he collected had tasty nuts. In 1858, Mueller named the new tree "Macadamia" after Dr. John Macadam. Hill then planted the first cultivated macadamia tree in his botanical gardens. He helped spread macadamia trees all over Queensland and the world.

Early Interest in Macadamias

After their rediscovery, early settlers talked about and grew macadamia trees. This was despite the fact that clearing land for farms destroyed many native trees. People quickly took macadamia seeds and nuts from their natural homes. They sent them to other parts of the world. For example, some went to Hawaii in the 1880s.

The New South Wales and Queensland governments also shared macadamia seeds widely.

Different Names for Macadamias

Macadamia trees and their nuts had many names back then. In New South Wales, they were called Bush Nuts or Mullimbimby Nuts. Further north, they were Queensland Nuts or Bauple Nuts. They were also known as Australia Nut.

Aboriginal groups had their own names for them. For example, "boombera" was common in New South Wales. In Queensland, they were often called "kendel" or "kindal kindal."

Starting the Macadamia Industry

The first macadamia farms in Australia started in New South Wales in the late 1870s. In Queensland, the first small farm was planted near Coolum in 1910.

In the early 1900s, government agriculture departments learned more about macadamias. They wanted to see if they could be grown for business. But it was hard to crack the thick shells of the nuts. This slowed down the industry's growth.

Growing Macadamias in the 1920s and 30s

A small macadamia industry began in Queensland in the 1920s and 1930s. A newspaper article from 1923 said that "a considerable acreage has recently been placed under nuts." Around this time, a small farm of about 30 macadamia trees was started at Colliston. This included the H2 Hinde tree.

Many people were interested in the nuts. In the 1930s, it was estimated that 20,000 macadamia trees were growing in backyards in Brisbane. Another 30,000 were between Grafton and Maryborough.

Government Support and Research

From 1931, the Queensland Department of Agriculture encouraged growing macadamia trees. By 1933, farmers were successfully planting macadamias between banana plants. They hoped the macadamias would become profitable later.

In 1939, William Hill, the manager of Colliston, helped with an article. It talked about where macadamia trees grew wild in the Gilston area. It also discussed their potential for commercial growing. This started a long relationship with John McGregor Wills. He was a Senior Advisor in Horticulture and a big supporter of macadamias.

After World War II, the government focused more on macadamia farming. In 1948, JM Wills visited Colliston again. He tagged the trees and took samples for testing. Some tests were done at the Maroochy Horticultural Experiment Station.

The H2 Hinde Tree's Registration

In 1960, three types of macadamia trees from Colliston were officially registered. They were named H1 Colliston, H2 Hinde, and H3 Stevenson. The H1 and H3 types had rough shells. The H2 Hinde was a Macadamia integrifolia type with smooth, medium-thick shells. It had a small dent in its shell.

The H2 Hinde tree is the only one left of the three original trees tagged by John McGregor Wills. Out of the three, only the H2 type was used for commercial purposes. The H2 Hinde tree on Colliston is the parent tree for all other trees of this type.

Macadamias Go Global

Efforts in Hawaii helped push the macadamia industry forward in Australia. In the 1950s and early 1960s, US scientists visited Australia. They took samples from Colliston's H-series trees to test in Hawaii. Australia didn't have a good grafting method until 1958.

The H2 Hinde tree proved to be a strong producer. In the early 1960s, big companies like CSR Ltd invested in the industry. The H2 Hinde was one of the best types for commercial growing. It was especially good for places with a mild climate.

From the 1960s to the 1980s, the H2 Hinde type was widely grown in Australian macadamia farms. It was very popular in New South Wales. Later, it was found that Hawaiian types didn't grow as well in Australia. So, more research was done to develop Australian types.

By 1983, the H2 Hinde was still a major type. A decade later, it was considered an industry standard. Today, Australia is the world's largest exporter of macadamia nuts.

Challenges and New Uses

In the 1980s, many H2 Hinde trees on farms reached the end of their useful lives. They were replaced with newer types that were resistant to certain diseases.

However, for the past 20 years, the H2 Hinde has been very important for nurseries. About 90% of all grafted macadamia trees use it as the "rootstock." This means new branches are grafted onto the H2 Hinde's strong roots. The original small farm where the H2 Hinde tree grew was destroyed by a fungal disease. But the H2 Hinde tree itself survived.

Description of the H2 Hinde Tree

Only one H2 Hinde tree remains from the original macadamia farm planted in the 1920s. The farm is now about 11.5 hectares (about 28 acres) of land. It's located between the Nerang River and Gilston Road. It's also near the Hinze Dam and Advancetown Lake.

The H2 Hinde (Macadamia integrifolia) tree is about eight meters (26 feet) tall. It has a metal tag painted orange on one of its main branches. This tag was likely put there by JM Wills in 1948. It shows that this is a parent tree. The other H1 and H3 macadamia trees were nearby, but only the H1 Colliston tree still survives.

Why the H2 Hinde Tree is Special

The H2 HINDE TREE (Macadamia integrifolia) on Colliston was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 14 August 2008. This means it's important for several reasons:

• It shows how Queensland's history has changed.

The H2 Hinde tree, planted around 1920, is very important to the macadamia nut industry in Australia. It played a key role in the industry's growth from the 1960s to the 1980s. Only two Australian macadamia types became very popular. The H2 Hinde from Colliston is the parent tree of one of these types.

After World War II, the macadamia nut industry grew a lot. It became Australia's biggest native food industry and leads the world in macadamia exports. The H2 Hinde tree helped make this success possible. First, it provided "scion wood" for new trees. In recent years, it has been used as the "parent" for most of the rootstock in commercial macadamia farms in Australia.