The ground this tree stands on was set aside in 1836, before Melbourne had a name worth arguing about. The Survey Paddock, as it was then, became Richmond Park and has been public land ever since, one of the earliest reservations in the city's history, and the peppercorn in Madden Grove is 3.55 metres round and 16 metres tall on that same ground. Schinus molle is South American, from the dry Andean foothills, and it is the tree of colonial Australia more than almost any other import. It went in along stock routes, station tracks, rail sidings and school fences by the thousand, because it took drought, poor soil and neglect without complaint, and its weeping grey-green foliage is now so ordinary in the landscape that people assume it is native. It is not. The City of Yarra's register put this one at over a hundred years old in 2012, which makes it over 110 now, and gave it the fullest set of tags of any tree checked here: particularly old, outstanding size, aesthetic value, and its place in the landscape. A second peppercorn of almost identical girth stands about 200 metres away. Only the register names this individual tree; the heritage listing covers the park around it. Burnley station is about ten minutes' walk, and the river path brings you here from the Yarra Boulevard trees.
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Getting there
Madden Grove, Richmond Park, Richmond VIC 3121
You can recognise it by the weeping grey-green foliage hanging like a willow's and the drooping strings of pink peppercorns, on a trunk 3.55 metres round. It stands in Madden Grove, 250 metres from the lemon-scented gum.
Free, always open. Public parkland within Richmond Park (Victorian Heritage Register place 71661), a riverside public reserve in continuous use since 1862 with sporting ovals and informal parkland. About 1.9km from the existing Yarra Boulevard cluster along the Yarra River shared path, extending that walk into a second stop.
Burnley railway station is roughly a 10 minute walk; also reachable via the Yarra River shared path from the Yarra Boulevard cluster.
In fruit
April and May, when the pink peppercorns hang in strings
Sources
Where the facts on this page come from. The story was written with AI from these sources, and readers who know the tree correct it.
- In the official register: City of Yarra
- City of Yarra Significant Trees register (, ref 27), CC BY 4.0, surveyed dbh 113cm, height 16m, age_estimate '100+ years' as at last update 2012-08-27
- Victorian Heritage Database place 71661, Richmond Park (National Trust citation): confirms Madden Grove sits within Richmond Park, reserved as a pu…