Pittosporum undulatum, known as Sweet Pittosporum or simply Pittosporum, is a small tree native to certain moist forests and woodlands on fertile soils on the coast and nearby ranges in southeastern Australia. Its natural range extends from southern Queensland to eastern Victoria. At the western end of its range it was recorded “in rocky places about Western Port” by Mueller in 1860. In recent years, concern about its spread particularly in Victoria has seen it branded nationally as an “environmental weed”. In Sydney however, calling it a weed puts at risk scarce remnants of vegetation where it is native.

Around Sydney, Pittosporum undulatum occurs naturally in widespread sandstone gully habitats, and in the understorey of two rare vegetation types, Blue Gum High Forest (BGHF) and Sydney Turpentine Ironbark Forest (STIF). Each type of forest has been reduced to about 1% of its former extent, much of which persists as small patches on edges of privately-owned farmland. Each forest type has been gazetted an Endangered Ecological Community (EEC) under the NSW Threatened
Species Conservation Act 1995. Compare the maps of Sydney’s Natural vegetation 1788 and 1990 – almost all the aqua blue and khaki green indicating these EECs in eastern Sydney has disappeared

Pittosporum undulatum has been branded an “environmental weed” and literature with this message distributed nationally. The ESA Bulletin of December 2000 contained a thesis summary entitled “The ecology of Pittosporum undulatum …. an environmental weed in southeast Australia”. The message members of the general public receive from the term “environmental weed” is that Pittosporum’s a weed that’s bad for the environment, and should be eliminated! If they see it growing, even in scarce remnants of its native habitat, they may bulldoze the whole understorey and all its associated biodiversity. This is what happened to convert forest

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