Rich, organic soil with a lot of moisture, even wet soils. Don't let it dry out. Prefers a somewhat acidic soil - pH 5.6 - 6.0.

Hopefully your part of Florida is mild enough, this is a tree I have only seen in places like Hawaii.

Where the bark is amazing.

There are some in southern California, they are trickier than most Aussie Eucs to grow there but are hardy enough when mature.

This post was edited by davidrt28 on Fri, Nov 7, 14 at 22:19

There was a guy in here a few years ago that was growing one in Homestead, Florida. I think the picture he posted showed the tree to be 10 or 12 ft. tall.
Yes, the bark IS amazing.
The first one I saw was in a botanical park behind Kapaa, Kauai, Hawaii. I had to run up to it to see if it was real.
Mike

My picture of the tree at the Huntington Botanical Gardens outside LA:

I think I saw some in San Diego last time I was there, maybe farther north also. I Hawaii they really look like they belong - unlike in California producing big, thick brightly colored trunks there. Tropicals and subtropicals in most of California and Florida always have the threat of low temperatures hanging over them, plus in California it is quite dry during the summer - away from streams, lake margins and irrigation lines.

In recent years REALLY dry.

Some sites in Hawaii get hundreds of inches of rain per year.

Yes, this is a tropical rain forest tree, unlike most other eucs. Native to Indoneasia, New Guinea and the Phillipines. Prefers it warm and wet.

LOL. I'm sure the Pasadena tree looks like that on the rare occasions it DOES rain in southern California, bboy. And I'm sure my middling digital camera didn't fully pick up on the coloration. I remember the picture not being like the experience. The bluish sheen in particular was washed out or missing from the camera's color gamut.

It certainly didn't seem to be struggling when I was there. Hard to tell from the picture but that trunk is at least 2' in diameter, probably more, and the crowns were up around 80' I'd guess.

To me the only issue with promoting this species in SoCal is it obviously isn't water wise. And therefore only belongs in botanical collections, IMHO.

This post was edited by davidrt28 on Sat, Nov 8, 14 at 18:00

hopefully these pass muster
http://treeaware.blogspot.com/2012/02/rainbow-eucalyptus.html

someone needs to get out there on a rainy day, so we can have the full Hawaiian experience

Here is a link that might be useful: http://treeaware.blogspot.com/2012/02/rainbow-eucalyptus.html