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Araucariaceae
Araucaria araucana
Photo Credit: Misty Shock Rule of UW Facilities
Specimen Size: 66.9ft tall, 26.5in in diameter.
Also called the Monkey Puzzle Tree
Location: Denny field north of Kitsap Ln NE and the Black walnut (towards Paccar Hall).
Historical Background: The Pewan is the national tree of Chile and is currently listed as an endangered species in its native range. For the Machupe living in the southern Andes mountain, specifically the Pehuénche tribe, this tree holds a great deal of cultural significance. It is used as the centerpiece in altars for harvest and fertility ceremonies. The commercial production of this tree to create wooden tools also provides income for many Indigenous groups. The resin is extracted for medicinal purposes and the cooked nuts provide nourishment.
Non-Native
Native Range: Chile and Argentina
Identifying Features: Another very distinctive tree, known, like the Ginko and Dawn Redwood, as a living fossil. The drooping rough branches of this tree are distinctly bedeckt in evergreen foliage of a most unusual nature, overlapping thick triangular and spiralling, with a round shoot and sharp tips completely covering the tips of branches where they grow. They are a light green in color and extremely persistent, lasting 10-15 years before browning and drying. Cones are likewise extremely distinctive, appearing almost fuzzy, with narrow pointed papery scales of green to brown color.
Identifying Features In Depth:
Form: A straight trunked tree with a sudden domed or cubicle crown of deeply swooping branches, each covered with the spiky foliage and growing in whorls. Branches are horizontal near the apex but droop elsewhere, turning up at the tips. The tree reaches up to about 80’ (25m).
Leaves: Leaves are beyond distinctive. They are plain to dark green, set spirally along the stem and heavily overlapping. Eat is near triangular in shape and overlaps with neighbors with the points towards the apex of each respective branch. They are hard and leathery with parallel venation. Extremely persistent, they occur on the tree for 10-15 years before drying. Each are about 1 ½” (4cm) in length.
Bark: Dark grey and fissured, showing circles of old branch scars on its surface.
Reproductive Bodies: Male cones are 2-4” (6-10cm) in length, a green to brown color hanging in clusters and composed of dry papery scales somewhat like that of spruce but far pointier. Female cones are larger, 6” (15cm) tall, and appear upright on branches, browning in the second autumn and breaking up to release 1.4” (4 cm) seeds. They two have papery scales clustered thickly together like fuzz, with sharp tips.
Native range of Araucaria araucana in western South America. Map compiled by Gonzales et al.
Below is the description found for this species on the original Brockman Memorial Tree Tour:
Historic Tree Tour Information: On the lawn in front of Denny Hall down towards Savery Hall is a Monkey Puzzle. This is surely among the most memorable of all the campus trees. It is a common introduction in the maritime Northwest but rare or nonexistent in the rest of the United States. It is a native of Chile and Argentina, being the only commonly cultivated South American conifer hereabouts. Newcomers here are always amazed at its dark, snake-like branches and prehistoric looking trunk.
Similar to the ginko, this is an extremely old species and is known as a living fossil. The nuts from female trees provide a valuable food resource. The wood is also useful. Although this specimen is a female and it makes the large cones, the nuts within are mostly hollow. A pollinator male (with dangling, cucumber shaped cones) is necessary for meaty seeds. Seeds are not usually produced until the tree is 30-40 years of age; however once established these trees can survive as long as 1,000 years.
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