Agathis australis (D.Don) Lindl.

അഗാതിസ്

Family : Araucariaceae

Synonym :

Podocarpus zamiifolius A.Rich.

Common Names : Agathis, Kauri

Flowering Period : NA

Distribution : Its native range is New Zealand North Island.

Habitat : Grown as ornamental plant.

Uses : Ornamental, timber yielding, gum yielding etc

Key Characters :
Monoecious trees 30-50 m tall and 100-400 cm or more in diameter. Young trees typically dominate their stands and have narrowly columnar crowns, which, after emerging above the codominant forest canopy, become globular or flat-topped. Trunk remarkably cylindrical, with almost no visible taper, often 15 m or more to the first branch on large trees. Bark ash-grey, blue-grey, or mottled purple, falling in large, thick flakes. Branches in whorls or irregularly horizontal; branches are shed at a basal abscission layer soon after their foliage dies, emphasizing the cylindrical bole form. The abscised small branchlets are typically a major component of the understory litter. Branchlets are smooth, glaucous. Buds are rounded, with imbricate scales. Leaves are alternate to subopposite, sessile, thick, coriaceous, parallel-veined. Juvenile leaves are glaucous-green, lanceolate, 5-10 cm × 5-12 mm. Adult leaves are green, slightly glaucous beneath near the petiole, ovate-lanceolate, 2-3.5 cm × 10-15 mm, apex obtuse, with 15 parallel nerves and a short petiole. Pollen cones are stout, cylindrical, 2-5 cm long, on a stout peduncle 1 mm wide; sporophylls are imbricate, margin weakly erose. Female cone subglobose, on a short peduncle, 5-7.5 cm diameter, glaucous-green, scales 1.8 cm long with a short mucronate umbo.