Flowering Trees by Season

Most Australian gardens flower magnificently for about six weeks in spring and then do nothing for the rest of the year. That is not a plant problem, it is a sequencing problem. Almost everyone buys flowering trees while they are in bloom at the nursery, which means everyone ends up with the same spring peak and the same flat autumn.

Start with the gaps, not the flowers

Before you choose a single species, work out when your garden is currently empty. Walk it in February, in May and in July, and be honest about what is happening. Most people find summer is green but static, autumn is nothing, and winter is bare.

Then buy against those gaps rather than for the season you happen to be shopping in. A garden with one good tree flowering in each quarter reads as far richer than a garden with four spring trees, even though the plant count is identical.

The second rule is proportion. Flowering trees are punctuation, not the sentence. Build the structure first with evergreens, hedges and a canopy, then place two or three flowering specimens where they will be seen from a window, a deck or the front door. A scatter of one of everything across a lawn looks restless and never resolves.

Spring: the crowded season

Spring is easy, which is exactly why it needs editing rather than adding.

• Jacaranda mimosifolia. The one everybody wants. Lilac blue in late October and November, 10 to 15m tall with a spreading crown 8 to 12m wide. It needs real space and it is only semi reliable south of Sydney, where cold springs delay the flower.
• Magnolia x soulangeana. Goblet flowers on bare wood in August and September, 4 to 6m tall and about as wide. One of the few genuinely small flowering trees that suits a courtyard.
• Pink trumpet tree (Handroanthus impetiginosus). Solid magenta on a leafless frame in August and September, 8 to 12m. Spectacular and still uncommon in Australian gardens.
• Ornamental pears and cherries (Pyrus, Prunus). White and pink from late July into September, 6 to 10m depending on cultivar. Best in cooler districts where they also colour in autumn.
• Bottlebrush (Callistemon) and paperbark (Melaleuca). Native, tough, flowering from September, 4 to 8m, and the strongest bird value of anything in the spring list.

Summer: the heat lovers

Summer flowering trees earn their place because they perform when the garden is most used.

• Crepe myrtle (Lagerstroemia indica cultivars). The best summer tree for Australian conditions. Crinkled flowers from December to March, then autumn colour, then beautiful mottled winter bark. Cultivars run from 3m to 8m, so check the cultivar rather than the genus.
• Poinciana (Delonix regia). Scarlet canopy from November to January, 10 to 15m tall and often wider than it is tall. Frost tender and with genuinely aggressive surface roots, so it belongs on a large warm block, well away from paving and pipes.
• Ivory curl tree (Buckinghamia celsissima). Australian rainforest native, cream flower spikes from December to February, a tidy 8 to 10m with a narrow crown. One of the most underused trees in the country and excellent as a street or driveway tree.
• Flowering gum (Corymbia ficifolia, grafted). Red, orange or pink from December to February. Buy grafted, always, because seedlings vary wildly in both colour and size, but check the cultivar for height as well: grafted selections run from about 2.5m for the compact ones to 6m for the larger, and the seedling grown species goes well past that.
• Frangipani (Plumeria rubra). Scented from December to April, 4 to 6m. Frost stops it cold, so keep it north of the frost line or against a warm wall.

Crepe myrtle is the one summer tree most gardens end up with, and Plant Drop's crepe myrtle selection guide is a good place to sort the dwarf, mid-sized and tree-sized cultivars before you commit.

Autumn: the most neglected quarter

Autumn is where most Australian gardens fall silent, and it is the easiest gap to fill.

• Hong Kong orchid tree (Bauhinia x blakeana). Large orchid like flowers from about March through to June in warmer districts, 6 to 8m tall and wide. Sterile, so it does not seed itself around the way the older Bauhinia variegata does.
• Firewheel tree (Stenocarpus sinuatus). Red wheels of flower from February to April on a slow growing rainforest native from Queensland and northern New South Wales. Upright and narrow for many years, reaching 8 to 12m in a garden and a good deal taller in rainforest, so allow around 8m of crown width as it matures. Glossy and very handsome even out of flower.
• Sasanqua camellia (Camellia sasanqua). Flowers from March to May, and depending on the cultivar and how you train it, it will be a 1.2 to 4m shrub, a clipped hedge or an espalier. The most versatile autumn flower there is, but pick the cultivar for the height you need rather than assuming the species.
• Tibouchina 'Alstonville'. Deep purple from March into May, 4 to 5m. Frost sensitive and wants a sheltered spot with acidic soil.

Autumn colour is a separate lever from autumn flower, and combining the two is what makes the season work. Our guide to autumn colour trees for Australia covers which deciduous species actually colour reliably in a warm climate.

Winter: when a single flower counts for most

A winter flowering tree is worth two spring ones, because there is nothing else competing for attention.

• Camellia japonica. Formal, long flowering from June to September, 2 to 5m in part shade depending on the cultivar. The backbone of a cool season garden.
• Wattles (Acacia species). Gold from July to September. Choose by species carefully, because sizes range from 3m shrubs to 12m trees and many are short lived at 15 to 20 years.
• Coast banksia (Banksia integrifolia). Cream candles through autumn and winter on a 6 to 15m salt tolerant tree, and the single most valuable winter nectar source you can plant.
• Magnolia 'Vulcan' and other deciduous magnolias. Late winter flower on bare wood, 4 to 6m, and dramatic against a dark backdrop.

What flowering trees drop, and where not to plant them

Every flowering tree also makes a mess, and the mess decides the position more often than the flower does.

• Jacaranda drops sticky flowers that stain and go slippery. Never over a pool, a driveway or an entry path.
• Poinciana drops flowers, then large woody pods, and lifts paving with surface roots. Give it lawn and 10m of clearance.
• Frangipani sheds soft flowers that break down fast, which makes it one of the few safe choices near a pool.
• Ornamental fruiting species drop fruit that ferments and attracts wasps. Keep them off outdoor dining areas.
• Bottlebrush and melaleuca shed spent flowers and fine litter continuously and will fill a gutter or a pool skimmer.

Building a year of colour on a normal block

On a standard suburban lot you have room for perhaps three flowering trees without the garden feeling like a collection. A workable combination is one spring specimen out the front where the street sees it, one summer tree near the outdoor living area where you will sit under it, and one autumn or winter performer framed by a window you look through every day.

Match mature size to the space honestly. A jacaranda on a 400 square metre block will eventually own the whole garden. For tighter sites, look at the small tree options in our guide to small trees for courtyards and townhouses, where crepe myrtle, magnolia and sasanqua do most of the work.

Buying at advanced size changes the maths on all of this. A flowering tree planted at 45L or larger is generally flowering within its first or second season rather than in five years, which matters when you are trying to fill a specific gap in the calendar. Every tree we supply arrives delivered and planted by our own crew, so you are choosing a position rather than organising a job. The detail is on our supplied and installed page.

Where to start looking

Browse the range in our flowering trees collection, which is organised around the species that actually perform in Australian conditions rather than catalogue novelties. For the shrubs and understorey plants that carry colour between the tree flushes, see our wider flowering plant range. If one of these trees is going to be the centrepiece of the front garden, read how to choose a feature tree first, because scale and position matter more than the flower colour.

Walk your garden in the season it looks worst, write that month down, and buy for it. Do that three times and you will have a year of colour instead of a spectacular fortnight.