Coromandel, Part 1

Jutting north into the ocean, creating its own sea, the Coromandel Peninsula is a favorite holiday spot for the denizens of the supercity of Auckland.  Thankfully, the winter weather keeps most of them away, and we made sure to visit away from school holidays!

With the mercurial weather, we decided to drive to the northern end of the peninsula.
 





On a lonely dirt road half way across the peninsula lies a hidden treasure.  Once common across the northern island lowlands, Kauri trees covered vast swaths of Coromandel.  The giants grow to truly massive sizes, living thousands of years in some cases.  Their great size was their undoing.  The settlers saw their broad, untapered trunk as an easy source of good timber.  Over 99.9% of the old-growth Kauri were felled to feed the foreign and domestic timber markets.  They were especially popular for framing houses and siding. Taking over 500 years to grow to these great sizes, they will never return to their former glory.  Despite the growing demand for timber, the Kiwi’s did not start planting timber farms until the mid-20th century.  After all, these forests go on forever! At least that was the sentiment at the time. 

Thankfully a few isolated pockets of forest survived the carnage, and by the 1960s, the ecological impact had started to sink into the national psyche.  This particular grove of giant Kauri survived due to a disagreement about a mining lease which was never worked.

The large tree on the right is about 800 years old.  At about 25m (80ft) tall, it is still short by mature Kauri standards.  The oldest recorded kauri was 4,000 years old at its death. 
 

Here it is at the base.  Over 1.9m (6ft) wide, the trunk barely tapers before the canopy.




These 500 old twins became joined at the “hip” when their trunks met a few hundred years ago.


One of the unique evolutionary adaptations that allow such a long life is the bark.  Flaking off in thick dinner plate like scabs, it discourages even the most aggressive parasitic plants (like the rata vine).  With no branches low on its trunk, the mature kauri leaves these other plants high and dry. 



Fun Fact (By Jen): You may wonder why we get so excited about trees or birds here. As much as I really like those things, there isn't much else here, either. NZ doesn't have any native mammals with  exception to 2 species of bats. Every fuzzy four-legged creature here is introduced by humans.