Photos | Legendary butcher Ted Cary tells full story of community's fight to save Como jacaranda trees

More than 20 jacarandas produce masses of beautiful purple flowers at this time each year and are as much a shire treasure as the historic Como Hotel opposite.

Mr Cary, 88, retired two years ago after working for 72 years in the Cremona Road shop opened by his father in 1926.

When the Leader visited him on Saturday in his nearby home, Mr Cary said he was keeping well and enjoying pottering in his garden while continuing to have radiotherapy for a tumour on his lung, which was diagnosed nearly three years ago.

"I can't speak more highly of the treatment and the care of the staff at St George Hospital Cancer Care Centre," he said.

When the conversation turned to the jacarandas, Mr Cary recalled how "all of Como marched on the council" to save the trees after a report by staff said many of trees were dying and should be removed and replaced with Chinese tallows.

Opponents included Sister Irene Haxton, who gave a jacaranda seed to the mother of every baby born at her Jacaranda Private Hospital in Woolooware, leading to a proliferation in the shire.

Mr Cary said Sister Haxton was involved in planting the jacarandas along Cremona Road.

"Sister Haxton got up at the council meeting and told the president (mayor) Michael Tynan those trees were for the families who didn't have a yard in which they could plant a seed," he said.

"She said, 'Mr Tynan, everyone of those trees represents a baby to me'.

"Then Sister Haxton really started on him.

"She said, 'Mr Tynan, when I delivered you into this world, I gave your mother a jacaranda seed to plant and the same for your brother. When I drive past and see those trees, I am very proud of what you have achieved...to date'.

"In other words, 'if you chop those trees down, you're gone'.

"Everyone in the public gallery stood up and clapped, and the council really had no other choice but to keep the trees."

Before the meeting, Sister Haxton described the proposal as "sheer vandalism" and said the trees just needed fertiliser and careful pruning.

In 2014, Warren Callender, who lived in English Street, Woolooware, where the Jacaranda Private Hospital, stood, told how Sister Haxton would drive him and her son Paul long distances to where jacarandas grew.

The boys would climb the trees to collect the pods, which were planted in jam tins collected from their neighbours and given to new mothers.