The rimu tree is a favourite native New Zealand tree that is found in all three main islands, especially on the lovely West Coast of the South Island, in the extensive podocarp forests they have there. (It’s one of the reasons I love that drive so much.) Rimu is an evergreen, coniferous tree, with tiny, soft leaves from pliable stems that droop and flow, and make it quite easy to identify them. It is slow-growing, living to 800-900 years, and can grow to 50 metres tall. Not far from my house, in a suburban nature reserve, there is an 800-year-old tree which I must try to photograph for you some time. Its Latin name is Dacrydium cupressinum.
It isn’t uncommon to see rimu in gardens on my walk. I’ll show them another day (I’m hoarding my tree photos for these posts!), but this relatively small example was in the Kaitoke Regional Park, where we walked a few weeks ago. There were plenty of other much taller and older rimu trees there in the bush (our common name for a native forest), but they were crowded amongst other tall trees, making it hard to distinguish them.
Rimu produces a beautiful golden wood and was often used for house construction, furniture and joinery. As a result of overuse, logging in public forests is now prohibited, though private forests still provide wood to furniture makers. Consequently, recycled timber is in high demand, both for flooring, and for other turned/carved wood products. It is commonly found in older houses; my house was built in the 1970s, and it was used for ceilings/floors, and stairs. When we renovated our bathroom, we stripped off a vinyl floor covering, and polished the floor to bring out the beautiful wood, and the rimu ceilings add a warm glow to our rooms.
Another in the Thursday Tree Love series – find all the other bloggers doing it here.
