Myrtle

    (Psydrax oleifolia)

Also known as: Wild Lemon, Brush Myrtle (formerly Canthium oleifolium)

This species of Myrtle is found as a spindly shrub all over the Central Highlands and just occasionally as a small tree.

It would be difficult for the layman to distinguish this species from its cousin P.Attenuata, and not worth differentiating as far as the timber is concerned. P.Oleifolia has shorter, more erect leaves and it's branches are straighter and more horizontal than P.Attenuata whose branches tend to have a wave like form.

Usually flowering in Spring, the flowers have the same strong scent as P.Attenuata.

The trunk has the same corrugations as P.Attenuata which produces the same attractive fleck right through the log.

This Myrtle machines and sands equally as well as P.Attenuata and finishes beautifully too. This Pomander was finished with Kunos 'Hard-wax' oil which is all I use on my work these days.

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