The Wollemi pine.
The Wollemi pine is in Family Araucariaceae.
Thought to be extinct a small group of pines were discovered in the Wollemi National Park in New South Wales in 1994.
Young plans were released to the public in 2006.
Very slow growing evergreen trees that can reach up to 40 m in height and live more than 1000 years.
The thick trunks, up to 1 m wide have dark brown knobbly bark.
Most trees appear to have multiple trunks or to be growing in clumps of up to 100 stems.
This appearance is due to multiple upright branches growing from the base of the tree.
These vertical branches look like trunks.
New branches form from dormant buds on the main trunk so the multiple vertical stems
will be of different sizes and thicknesses.
A second type of branch grows horizontally and they rarely branch.
These hold the cones at the tip (trees are either male or female).
When the cone matures the branch dies.
Descriptions of the leaves gets a bit complicated as the leaves, and their arrangement varies between
the vertical and horizontal branches and between juvenile and adult leaves.
Also the leaf base is twisted which alters the appearance of their actual insertion.
The twist can make a spiral arrangement appear to be in ranks.
Simply put leaf arrangement can be spiral or opposite (or nearly so).
Leaves appear to be in 2 or 4 vertical rows.
They have no stalk and the broad base runs down the branch.
Leaves have parallel veins.
Young leaves are thin, deep green above and paler underneath.
Leathery adult leaves, narrow and linear are a dull green.
Narrow, triangular leaves up to 10 mm long with a pointed tip are seen on vertical branches.
The cylindrical male cones are up to 11 cm long by 2 cm wide.
The reddish-brown sporophylls are spirally arranged on short stalks.
The female cones are held higher on trees than the pollen cones.
They are spiny, up to 8 cm long by 10 cm wide, green then brown.
There is 1 ovule on the top of each cone scale but they are not attached to the scale.
The pale brown winged seeds are up to 7 mm long.
J.F.
