The Talking Tree of Newstead House
Approximate location.
A speaker hidden in the garden bed narrates Newstead House's history to whoever pauses under the giant fig growing on the driveway roundabout in front of it, which is where the tree earned its local name, the Talking Tree. The fig has the better claim to the story: Patrick Leslie built the house in 1846, and by the property's own account the fig was already a substantial tree when he did, older than everything else on the site. It is a Cunningham's fig, Ficus virens, and it has hollowed out the way old figs do, described on Queensland's heritage register as a magnificent hollowed out Cunningham fig believed to be 200 years old, growing inside its own circular garden bed. Nobody has taped its girth, so 200 is a long-held estimate rather than a measurement, and one account puts it closer to 300. The tree stands on the public entrance drive, open every day with no gate and no ticket. Newstead House itself, the museum building further up the drive, only opens Friday to Sunday, but the fig and its roundabout sit outside that line. If you know its real age, tell us.
Entrance driveway roundabout, Newstead Park, 191A Breakfast Creek Road, Newstead QLD 4006You can recognise it by the hollowed trunk and the speaker hidden in its garden bed, narrating the house's history. It stands in the circular bed on the entrance driveway roundabout at Newstead Park.
Free. Stands in the circular garden bed on the entrance driveway roundabout inside Newstead Park, a public Brisbane City Council park with no gate or fee; Newstead House itself (the museum building) is separately ticketed and open Friday to Sunday, but the tree is outside on the public drive, not inside the ticketed grounds.
Breakfast Creek Rd at Evelyn St bus stop (routes 227, 300), about 2 minutes' walk. Bowen Hills rail station is about 9 minutes' walk; Teneriffe CityCat ferry terminal about 16 minutes' walk.
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from.
