In 1908 a gardener cut through this tree's taproot and sealed the wound with a blowtorch.
Queensland Kauri
Agathis robusta
Queensland kauri grows wild only in a strip of eastern Australia, but the species travelled well. We map 4 of them, in 3 cities.
Sydney's, in the Royal Botanic Garden's Palm Grove, grew from a seed picked on New Year's Day 1849 by the garden's first director. Hobart's, in the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens, is rare enough to carry four separate significance ratings on the city's tree register, aesthetic, dimensions, age and rarity, where most trees earn one or two. Los Angeles has two. The Huntington's was planted in 1890; in 1908 a gardener cut through its taproot to move it out of the way of the mansion and sealed the wound with a blowtorch, and in 2021 it was named California's biggest Queensland kauri, 34 metres tall. The one in Chavez Ravine Arboretum, above Dodger Stadium's parking lots, has long been called the largest in the country on reputation alone.
Los Angeles
Long reputed as one of the oldest Queensland kauri in the United States, this one is not in a botanical garden.
Sydney
The seed was picked on New Year's Day, 1849, at Maryborough in Queensland, by John Carne Bidwill, the first director of the Royal Botanic Garden Sydney.
Hobart
This tree is listed under four separate headings on Hobart's significant tree register: aesthetic significance, outstanding dimensions, venerable age, and rarity.
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