Stoke Poges Wexham & Fulmer Horticultural SocietyAraucaria and Wollemia
The Society's Interest in Conservation of Endangered Species
in its 125th Anniversary Year
By pure chance, the plant collector Archibald Menzies, saw some unidentifiable nuts on his table when dining out in Chile. That was at the Spanish Viceroy's residence in Santiago. They were so unusual that he pocketed some of them. That is how Araucaria araucana came to Kew. Now, in its native clime, Araucaria is an endangered species. It thrived in England and was distributed throughout the plant collections of Eighteenth Century Europe. In England it became known as the 'monkey puzzle tree', an unlikely name resulting from a chance remark in the early 1800s to the effect that "it would certainly be a puzzle for a monkey to climb". It is threatened in the wild in Chile and is listed under Appendix 'A' of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
Based on fossil records, Araucaria is estimated to have an evolutionary history of some 300m years. It gives its name to the family Araucariaceae and, until recently, only two living members of the family were known - it and Agathis australis, the Kauri Pine of Norfolk Island which is certainly not hardy in England. There is a fine specimen of A. araucana growing in the Memorial Gardens at Stoke Poges.
In the 1990s, David Noble, a Ranger for the Wollemi National Park in New South Wales, investigating an unexplored deep gorge, encountered a grove of trees which he could not identify but he realised they were of the greatest botanical significance. They were identified at the Sydney Botanic Garden as trees known hitherto only from the fossil record and which were clearly assignable to the family Araucariaceae. Being in a deep gorge for a geological period of some 300m years, they had been protected from varying extremes of climatic conditions throughout that immense period of time.
In the Autumn of 2008, the Society's Chairman was able to obtain a specimen of Wollemia nobilis which he grew potted up throughout the following Winter. It was duly planted by the Society's President and Chairman at 2pm on 5th May 2009 in the Memorial Gardens at Stoke Poges, in close association with the Araucaria araucana. All such Gymnosperms and, for that matter, most other trees, have a beneficial association with soil fungi. This is the mycorrhizal association and resting spore granules of a mixture of five species of Glomus were mixed in the soil with the tree roots.
Before the ice ages, Wollemia was an important tree of northern latitudes and was clearly worldwide in distribution under such conditions. Hopefully, it would appear to be eminently suited to life in England. We understand that it has considerable tendency to coppice as has been seen in the Wollemi Gorge so it should be possible to propagate it vegetatvely in the future.
At exactly the same time and day, HM The Queen and HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, planted a Wollemia nobilis at RBG Kew in celebration of the 250th anniversary of Kew Gardens, so it will be interesting to compare progress of the two trees. Our Society was exactly 125 years old on that day.
The Society's Interest in Conservation of Endangered Species
in its 125th Anniversary Year
By pure chance, the plant collector Archibald Menzies, saw some unidentifiable nuts on his table when dining out in Chile. That was at the Spanish Viceroy's residence in Santiago. They were so unusual that he pocketed some of them. That is how Araucaria araucana came to Kew. Now, in its native clime, Araucaria is an endangered species. It thrived in England and was distributed throughout the plant collections of Eighteenth Century Europe. In England it became known as the 'monkey puzzle tree', an unlikely name resulting from a chance remark in the early 1800s to the effect that "it would certainly be a puzzle for a monkey to climb". It is threatened in the wild in Chile and is listed under Appendix 'A' of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).
Based on fossil records, Araucaria is estimated to have an evolutionary history of some 300m years. It gives its name to the family Araucariaceae and, until recently, only two living members of the family were known - it and Agathis australis, the Kauri Pine of Norfolk Island which is certainly not hardy in England. There is a fine specimen of A. araucana growing in the Memorial Gardens at Stoke Poges.
In the 1990s, David Noble, a Ranger for the Wollemi National Park in New South Wales, investigating an unexplored deep gorge, encountered a grove of trees which he could not identify but he realised they were of the greatest botanical significance. They were identified at the Sydney Botanic Garden as trees known hitherto only from the fossil record and which were clearly assignable to the family Araucariaceae. Being in a deep gorge for a geological period of some 300m years, they had been protected from varying extremes of climatic conditions throughout that immense period of time.
In the Autumn of 2008, the Society's Chairman was able to obtain a specimen of Wollemia nobilis which he grew potted up throughout the following Winter. It was duly planted by the Society's President and Chairman at 2pm on 5th May 2009 in the Memorial Gardens at Stoke Poges, in close association with the Araucaria araucana. All such Gymnosperms and, for that matter, most other trees, have a beneficial association with soil fungi. This is the mycorrhizal association and resting spore granules of a mixture of five species of Glomus were mixed in the soil with the tree roots.
Before the ice ages, Wollemia was an important tree of northern latitudes and was clearly worldwide in distribution under such conditions. Hopefully, it would appear to be eminently suited to life in England. We understand that it has considerable tendency to coppice as has been seen in the Wollemi Gorge so it should be possible to propagate it vegetatvely in the future.
At exactly the same time and day, HM The Queen and HRH the Duke of Edinburgh, planted a Wollemia nobilis at RBG Kew in celebration of the 250th anniversary of Kew Gardens, so it will be interesting to compare progress of the two trees. Our Society was exactly 125 years old on that day.