Garden
City Botanic Gardens
Riverside colonial-era garden where a curator's world-first macadamia tree still bears nuts.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to the City Botanic Gardens in Brisbane follows Walter Hill, the gardens' first curator, and an unproven tree grown from seeds gathered near Gympie in the eighteen fifties. It traces his years turning a convict vegetable patch into a testing ground for Queensland's future crops, and the gamble on a nut nobody was sure was safe to eat. You'll hear how the tree's name reached a scientist called John Macadam, who never once tasted it. Look for the same tree still rooted at the rainforest's southern edge.
This audio guide was created using AI.