Australia is home to the world’s tallest flowering plant, which are the mountain ash trees found in Victoria and Tasmania. The mountain ash can grow over 110 meters tall and up to 34 meter in girth.
Only the giant Redwood trees in California are taller but they are not considered flowering plants since they are conifer trees. Mountain ash can reach their maximum height in as little as 250 years.
Mountain Ash is the most readily identifiable feature of the tall forests east of Melbourne. It is a fast-growing single trunk tree with small open canopy to 100 m.
From summer to winter it is profuse with small white flowers. Long ribbons of bark hang from the trunks of large trees. Mature trees become heavily buttressed.
The trees are characteristically tall and straight, typically with no branches until near the crown. Increased maturity is characterised by trees becoming more widely spaced and heavier in the trunk,
with a greater number of tree hollows forming, In the absence of fire, old age and death occurs at around 400 - 500 years.