Scientific name: Agathis macrophylla (Lindley) M.T. Masters 1892

Synonyms: Agathis brownii (Lem.) L.H.Bailey, Agathis longifolia (Lindl. ex Gordon) Warb., Agathis obtusa (Lindl.) Mast., Agathis vitiensis (Seem.) Benth. & Hook.f. ex Drake, Agathis vitiensis (Seem.) Benth. & Hook. f., Dammara brownii Lem., Dammara longifolia Lindl. ex Gordon, Dammara macrophylla Lindl., Dammara obtusa Lindl., Dammara perousei C.Moore ex Hook., Dammara vitiensis Seem.

Common names: Fijian kauri, Pacific kauri (English), Ndakua (Fijian), Kauri (Maori)

Description

Tree to 30(-45) m tall, with cylindrical, straight, unbuttressed to slightly basally swollen trunk to 1.5(-3) m in diameter, typically unbranched for no more than 10(-20) m. Bark light brown and smooth at first, weathering light gray, flaking in round scales to reveal pinkish brown to reddish brown fresh bark, and finally becoming heavily pockmarked and mottled. Crown fairly open, conical at first, passing through cylindrical to broadly vase-shaped with a domed top in age, with fairly slender to heavy, sharply upwardly angled to practically horizontal branches bearing branchlets along their length. Branchlets bluish green with a persistent, thin waxy film, openly to densely clothed with foliage. Leaves shiny dark green above, duller dark green to bluish green beneath and with or without a thin film of wax, (3.5-)6-9(-12) cm long (to 15 cm in juveniles, hence the scientific name, Latin for “big leaf”), (1-)2-3 cm wide (to 4 cm in juveniles), widest before the middle, tapering steadily or gradually and then more abruptly to the rounded or roundly triangular tip (sharply triangular in juveniles) and quite abruptly to the roundly wedge-shaped to rounded base on a short petiole 1-8 mm long. Pollen cones (2-)4-6(-8) cm long (to 12 cm after the pollen is shed), (8-)15-20(-25) mm thick, with three or four pairs of larger, loosely cupping, sterile scales at the base on a short stalk (0-)3-5(-7) mm long. Each pollen scale with 6-14 pollen sacs and a humped external face. Seed cones with remnants of a waxy film at maturity, nearly spherical to a little longer than wide, 10-13 cm long, 8-10 cm thick. Seed scales without a large, tonguelike projection. Seed body 10-12 mm long and 7-10 mm wide, the larger wing 15-17 mm by 12-15 mm, the smaller one narrowly triangular, projecting up to about 10 mm.

Sporadically distributed among the islands of Melanesia, from the Santa Cruz group (Solomon Islands), through Espiritu Santo, Aneityum, and Erromango in Vanuatu, to Vanua Levu, Viti Levu, and two smaller islands in Fiji. Scattered or forming small groves in, or emergent above, the canopy of rain forests on gentle to steep mountain slopes; 75-600(-900) m.

Conservation Status

Red List Category & Criteria: Endangered

Agathis macrophylla meets the B2 criterion for Endangered as its area of occupancy (AOO) is certainly less than 500 km² and there is continuing decline due to logging and deforestation in at least some parts of its range. This situation is exacerbated by the near total lack of protected areas relevant to the species; only one fairly substantial reserve exists. Previously, this species was listed as Near Threatened. However, individual island populations may well be severely threatened, e.g. that on Utupua in the Santa Cruz Group. Agathis macrophylla is now quite rare outside plantations in the Santa Cruz Group, though an unlogged subpopulation apparently survives on the upper Lawrence River on Vanikoro.

Agathis macrophylla is an emergent tree in lowland to low montane tropical rainforest; usually growing in soils derived from volcanic rocks like basalt. Its altitudinal range is recorded from herbarium collections as being between 75 and 900 m a.s.l. In Fiji on the main islands, it is most common between 600 and 900 m a.s.l. A. macrophylla appears to behave as a normal component of rainforests dominated by angiosperms. This means that it is capable of small-gap regeneration like other large forest trees.

The major threat to this species is logging in natural forests, which is unsustainable but ongoing in some parts of its range. Deforestation has followed much logging in the past, reducing the area of occupancy of the species, but this process, while not ceased, is slowing now.

The wood of this species is white or sometimes with a reddish hue and known in Fiji as Dakua wood and in the Santa Cruz Group as Vanikoro kauri. It is very valuable and used for construction, for flooring in houses, for masts, booms and spars in sailing boats, for carpentry and for furniture making. Resin is tapped from trees, but also dug from the ground (subfossil resin) and used in making varnishes, pottery glazing, and dying cloth black with the smoke from burning it. Fijian Kauri Pine has been planted as a forestry tree in the Solomon Islands (Santa Cruz Group) and elsewhere in the southwestern Pacific in an attempt to obtain timber more sustainably from a truly renewable resource.

The only protected area specifically designated for Agathis macrophylla is the Erromango Kauri Reserve in Vanuatu, on the island of that name. It protects 3,205 ha of rainforest with good stands of emergent Fijian kauri pines. On Fiji, there are a few very small protected areas relevant to this species but almost all remaining stands of these trees are in forest without official protected status. No protected areas exist in the Santa Cruz Group on Utupua and Vanikoro Islands

References

Farjon, A. (2010). A Handbook of the World's Conifers. Koninklijke Brill, Leiden.
Eckenwalder, J.E. (2009) Conifers of the World: The Complete Reference. Timber Press, Portland.
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species, International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. Cambridge, UK /Gland, Switzerland