Eucalyptus campaspe
Eucalyptus campaspe, commonly known as silver gimlet or the silver-topped gimlet, is a species of tree that is endemic to Western Australia. It has smooth, shiny bark, lance-shaped adult leaves, flower buds in groups of seven, white flowers and cup-shaped or conical fruit. Description. "Eucalyptus campaspe" is a tree or mallet that typically grows to a height of and has smooth, shiny, silver to coppery bark. The stems are twisted and a lignotuber is not formed. The leaves on young plants and on coppice regrowth are lance-shaped to egg-shaped, long, wide and covered  with a powdery white bloom. Adult leaves are arranged alternately, lance-shaped, long and wide on a petiole long. They are also dull, glaucous to grey-green and weather to glossy with age. The flower buds are arranged in groups of seven in leaf axils on a flattened peduncle long, the individual buds on pedicels long. Mature flower buds are oval, long, wide and glaucous with a conical operculum. Flowering occurs between January and March and the flowers are white. The fruit is a glaucous, woody, cup-shaped to hemispherical or conical capsule long and wide with a broad disc  and the valves protruding. Taxonomy and naming. "Eucalyptus campaspe" was first formally described by the botanist Spencer Le Marchant Moore in 1899 in a paper entitled "The Botanical Results of a Journey into the Interior of Western Australia", published in the "Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society". The type specimen had been collected by Moore in 1895 from near Gibraltar in the Goldfields area of Western Australia. The specific epithet ("campaspe") refers to Campaspe, the mistress of Alexander the Great, but the allusion is not known. "Eucalyptus campaspe" is one of the six true gimlet species that have buds in  groups of seven. The other true gimlets are "E. ravida" , "E. effusa" , "E. salubris", "E. terebra" and "E. tortilis". The non-glaucous "E. salubris" is easily distinguished from "E. ravida" and "E. campaspe" both of which have conspicuously glaucous branchlets. Distribution. Silver gimlet is found on stony hillsides and flats in the Goldfields-Esperance region between Kalgoorlie and Norseman where it grows in sandy-loam-clay soils. It is often part of low woodland communities on calcareous plains or alluvial flats. Associated species in this environment include trees such as: "E. salubris", "E. gracilis" often with "E. salmonophloia" and "Casuarina  cristata". Also included in these woodlands are shrubs like "Santalum acuminatum", "Atriplex vesicaria", "Atriplex nummularia" and species of "Eremophila" and "Dodonaea". Ground species in these communities include "Plantago debilis", "Helipterum strictum", "Gnephosis brevifolia", "Ptilotus exaltatus" and "Senecio glossanthus".