Hoop Pines, Bald Hills
| Hoop Pines, Bald Hills | |
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Hoop Pines, 2009
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| Location | 34 Strathpine Road, Bald Hills, City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia |
| Coordinates | 27°18′54″S 153°00′15″E / 27.3151°S 153.0041°ECoordinates: 27°18′54″S 153°00′15″E / 27.3151°S 153.0041°E |
| Design period | 1840s - 1860s (mid-19th century) |
| Built | - |
| Official name: Hoop Pines | |
| Type | state heritage (landscape) |
| Designated | 22 February 2002 |
| Reference no. | 602346 |
| Significant period | 1850s (historical) |
 Location of Hoop Pines, Bald Hills in Queensland
Location of Hoop Pines, Bald Hills in Queensland
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The Hoop Pines are a heritage-listed pair of trees at 34 Strathpine Road, Bald Hills, City of Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. They were added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 22 February 2002.
The two mature Hoop Pines situated in front of the Administration Building of St Paul's Anglican School, Bald Hills, are believed to mark the location of the original Stewart Farmhouse at Bald Hills. The Stewart family, along with their relatives the Duncans, were the earliest non-indigenous settlers in the Bald Hills area (known to Aboriginal people as Wyampa) and later established one of the district's most successful dairy farms. The taller of the Hoop Pines may be remnant old growth vegetation, approximately 190 years old. The smaller Hoop Pine may be approximately 140 years old - either planted or a seedling from the older tree.
The prevalence of valuable logging trees such as hoop and bunya pines and red cedar was one of the principal attractions for the establishment of a penal settlement at Moreton Bay in the 1820s. Historian JD Steele suggests that "Brisbane owes its foundations to Oxley's enthusiasm for its river and its indigenous pine tree, Araucaria cunninghamii, usually known as the hoop pine. The tree was first observed by Oxley on 1 December 1823, on the banks of the Pine River near Petrie . . .". Within 50 years, most of the hoop pine had been extracted from the Moreton Bay region.
The establishment of Bald Hills as a farming community in the late 1850s was closely linked to the move by Scottish squatters John and David McConnel of Durundur on the Upper Stanley River (south of the Conondale Range and west of the Glass House Mountains), and their pro-Brisbane, pro-John Dunmore Lang associates, to establish a port at Cabbage Tree Creek, Sandgate in the 1850s. The move was given impetus with the reinstatement of the northern passage to Moreton Bay, around the northern end of Moreton Island and south past Redcliffe and Cabbage Tree Creek, as the principal shipping passage in 1848, following the wreck of the Sovereign in the South Passage in March 1847. In the early 1850s the McConnels and their associates, who supported John Dunmore Lang's vision of the development of a "cotton colony" north of Brisbane between Cabbage Tree Creek and South Pine River, lobbied for the establishment of a port at Cabbage Tree Creek, which they claimed was more convenient for shipping than the Brisbane River, offered safe berths for larger vessels, and in particular, would give more direct port access to the Stanley River squatters, who could travel via North Pine through Bald Hills to Cabbage Tree Creek. The McConnels were joined by a number of prominent Brisbane businessmen, including John Richardson, Thomas Dowse, Robert Davidson and George Raff, who in 1852 called for a port to rival Cleveland, and the development of a resort suburb, at Bramble Bay. The New South Wales government had already set aside a village reserve at the head of Cabbage Tree Creek, and now the Scottish connection was pushing for its survey and the survey of a road from Brisbane. The village was surveyed in 1852 and in November 1853 the first Sandgate town lots were offered at public auction. There was much interest, and high prices were obtained, with the McConnels, Dowse and Robert Davidson purchasing heavily.
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