New Zealand
Champion
"Tane Mahuta"
Kauri
Agathis australis
Waipoua National Forest
Northern North
Island, New Zealand
Circumference
= 540 inches (45 feet)
Height =
169 feet
Volume =
8,635 cubic feet
Estimated Age
= 2,100 years |
Tane Mahuta is New Zealand's tallest
Kauri Tree, growing
in Waipoua Forest on the northern end of North Island. Its massive
smooth, gray-white trunk rises 59 feet before a branch appears. The
gigantic specimen is a remanent of the tremendous ancient subtropical
rain forest that once grew there, a survivor of 200 years of intensive
logging. By counting rings from felled trees of similar circumference,
Tane Mahuta is
believed to be 2,100 years old.
Not far away in Waipoua
Forest is a tree with the broadest trunk, known by its Maori name:
Te Matua Ngahere,
or "Father of the Forest."
Although shorter than Tane Mahuta,
Te Matua Ngahere is much stouter—59 feet in girth—and free of
branches for 33 feet from the ground. The tree's total height is 98
feet.
On the slopes of Tutamoe,
above Kaihu, stood Kairaru. This awesome
tree is over three times larger than Tane Mahuta—perhaps 15,997 cubic
feet of timber—larger than today's greatest redwoods, and, in its day,
the largest tree in the world.
Tane Mahuta is
guessed to be 2,100 years old, but likely Kairaru was over 4,000 years
old when fire destroyed it in the 1880's. |
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The giant
Kauri is a kind of primitive pine that belongs to the ancient
Araucariaceae Family of trees that were
prolific before dinosaurs and the Gondawana super-continent broke up. In
far northern New Zealand swamps, kauri trees were discovered preserved
under water that grew 30-50,000 years ago.
The
Southern Kauri (Agathis australis) is found only in New
Zealand's northern tropical rain forest, where they grow to immense
size. They rival California's giant redwoods. Early settlers who saw
their massive columns of smooth, white trunks, and elegant tracery of
high canopy likened them to Gothic |
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cathedrals. The largest
individuals alive today are more than 2,000 years old.
Before Europeans arrived,
Kauri Forest covered 4 million acres of New
Zealand's North Island. When Captain Cook saw the forests in 1769, he
wrote, "The banks of the river were completely clothed with the finest
timber my eyes have ever seen..." His excitement attracted European
timber men, who brought wholesale destruction to the ancient and
majestic kauris. In 150 years, they shrunk to barely 18,420 acres.
Late in the 20th century,
people began to appreciate Kauri Forests
once more. Today, several refuges protect the remaining giants for
posterity. In Waipoua Forest, visitors can walk among trees that have
grown for 2,000 years to see the best-known gigantic specimen of all:
Tane Mahuta—"The Lord of the Forest"— the
tallest standing Kauri Tree.
Recently, seed from
Tane Mahuta was gathered to propagate into
a new generations to christen a new millennium dedicated to the
reforestation of New Zealand. For news about Tane
Mahuta's Millennium Forest, visit:
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