One of my local walking haunts is the Mount Pleasant Track in the Illawarra Escarpment State Conservation Area: lots of scrambling, lots of weeds, lots of mud, lots of erosion… and then… you find yourself in an extraordinary high green place that seems to lift the top of your head off and take you to another dimension.

There's a unique quality to it, between the leaf- and humus-rich soil on the forest floor, assorted ferns ascending and declining, the narrow stems of new trees striving to grow upwards and the broad spreading canopy of the established trees. I could spend days there wandering, exploring, observing.

Right now though, the big thing is fruits of the Schizomeria ovata or Native Crab Apple, which are littering the forest floor. They are present in huge numbers, turning the track white in some areas.  

In the Illawarra, Native Crab Apple is a large tree, common in the warm temperate rainforests that dominate the higher altitudes of the Illawarra escarpment, uncommon on the foothills and very rare on the coastal plain.

It can also be found growing on sandstone soils in the Sydney area, where it grows as a bushy shrub rather than a tree; the areas around Brokers Nose are home to a few specimens with more or less shrubby form. Different soil types can make a huge difference to the form and habit of a species, and Native Crap Apple is a classic illustration of that variation.    

One of the challenges of identifying trees in the rainforest is that at eye level you're mostly looking at trunks and bark. Native Crab Apple is no exception. But if you're lucky enough to see a new shoot coming up out of the ground from a large tree, you can check out the leaves.

And, of course, if the round creamy white fruit are on the ground beneath the tree, that's a really good clue that you're beneath a Native Crab Apple.