New Zealand: Fierce lancewood

At Otari-Wilton’s Bush in Wellington on February 20th I saw specimens of fierce lancewood, Pseudopanax ferox (as in ferocious). According to a sign there: “When the lancewood reaches a certain height, it changes shape and turns into a small branching tree. The leaves change too and become shorter, softer and lose their fierce hooks.” Here’s that later stage, which I certainly wouldn’t have suspected to be the same kind of tree:

For more information, you can visit plantlust.com, which describes fierce lancewood in a way that I can’t top: “One of those cool dinosaur plants found down Kiwi way that catches the eye and triggers the lust gene in plant geeks and adventurous gardeners.”

© 2015 Steven Schwartzman