Whither the Wollemi?

Although the Wollemi is usually referred to as a "pine", it isn't. These trees were first discovered as recently as 1994 only 150km or so from the city of Sydney, having previously been known only as fossils - some dating back 200M years! The most recent known fossil was 4M years old. The Wollemi gains its name from the National Park where about 100 surviving trees were found in a hidden canyon: since then, they have been intensively propagated for parks and domestic gardens. These are images (also PiPs 1,2) of our potted example. Worryingly, the giant bushfires running in Australia are also through the Wollemi National Park (report screenshot PiP3) - I hope the last wild Wollemis are unaffected.

UPDATE: I've now updated PiP3 with the latest report - the fire area is now larger than Greater London. I also highly recommend viewing this great video of a recently arrived DC10 aerial tanker dropping fire retardant.

Explored.