By PHILIP ENGLISH
For ecologist Graeme Platt Auckland contains a treasure trove of his beloved Norfolk pines, towering coniferous trees that shared Earth with the dinosaurs.
The region has so many fine specimens of introduced Norfolk pines that dozens of tree lovers are being invited to an international symposium Mr Platt is
helping to organise next year.
Auckland boasts probably the world's tallest Norfolk pine, at about 60m, and some of the largest of its Araucaria relations, the monkey-puzzle tree from South America and the hoop pine from Australia.
Mr Platt said the March 2002 Araucaria and kauri meeting would be attended by members of the International Dendrology Society, which promotes the study of woody trees and shrubs as well as the protection of rare and endangered trees. It has more than 1500 members in 50 countries.
He said Araucaria and kauri trees were held in high esteem in every country where they grew naturally.
In Papua New Guinea Araucaria trees were treated as sacred. In Australia Aborigines organised gatherings which coincided with the fall of seed cones from bunya bunya trees, also from the Araucaria family. In South America many people ate the seeds from Araucaria trees.
Mr Platt said one of his favourite places was a damp and shady grove where Norfolk pines, naturalised bunya bunya and two Cook's pines grew in a gully in the Auckland Domain alongside the Domain Walk.
"It's truly magnificent on a world scale yet nobody knows about it," he said.
The Norfolk thought to be the tallest in the world is in the grove.
"This is one of the great things about Araucaria," he said. "They probably only start to get growing at 100 years. The big trees around Auckland have got a lot of life in them."
Mr Platt said fossils showed that Araucaria such as Norfolk pines once grew in New Zealand.
They died out, leaving the pines growing today on Norfolk Island as descendants of trees trapped there following the break-up of Gondwanaland, the ancient supercontinent made up of Antarctica, Africa, Australia, South America and the Indian subcontinent.
