POHUTUKAWA

Northern Advocate, 10 July 1935, Page 4

POHUTUKAWA

: . (By Jeanne Erceg, Mata. Age 15 ■ '■''"■‘"'years)’/ 1 ’" - When the canoe Arawa drew- near to the shores of New Zealand, and the Maoris on board set eyes for the first time on this land, they saw with surprise and delight against the bare cliffs masses, of crimson glory, whose brilliant red was mirrored in the calm waters below. A chieftain, springing to his feet, cried: “Look, red head’ ornaments growing on trees! I’m throwing my old ones away!” So saying he tossed into the water the headdress he was wearing. Others followed.. : his lead, and! the moment their feet touched the shore, those light-hearted adventurers, attracted 1 by the flaming colour of the pohutukawa’s flowers, ran to gather them. Alas, the flowers of Ibvely hue were also frail! Fast they /faded and fell, leaving their eager gatherers dismayed and regretful of the gay feathers: they had, in their excitement, cast into the sea. Ever since that far-off day, as the Christmas season comes around, the pohutukawa has continued to delight the eye of both Maori and Pakeha with its masses of blood-red blossom. Because it; flowers at Christmas time, it is -often called Christmas tree. Its Maori name; , pohutukawa," means “splashed/by" the spray,” the Maoris noticing that it chose to grow along the seashore, flourishing in the salt air and the spray froth: the ocean’s waves. Indeed, our most beautiful 'flowering tree, which grows only in the North Island, is seldom found far from sea or lake, and rocky cliffs are no obstacle to its creeping, twisty roots. They often clamber over the surface for long distances before succeeding in anchoring in a friendly cleft or crevice., Sometimes the tree may be seen hanging from the top of a precipice by its clinging roots, while its branches , dip almost into the water below. The trunk and branches, like the roots, are often gnarled and twisted, so that the lines:— Stiff, shaky, writhing trunks that clave And crawled to any hold the ramparts gave, aptly describe the pohutukawa’s manner of growth. The strong, twisted branches were often used by the Maoris as anchors for their canoes. The brilliant colour of the flowers, which is the plant’s greatest glory, is provided not by the petals, but by the fluffy clusters of long, slender, crimson filaments or stamens, each one tipped with its tiny anther. The petals themselves are very small and almost without colour. The buds are white, woolly balls, and the backs of the leaves are also white and woolly, being covered with a thick coating of small hairs. It is this downy covering, that makes it possible , for the pohutukawa to grow comfortably by the sea, protecting the leaves,.as it does, from the salt; which would otherwise dry the [eaves and take from them too much of the tree’s moisture. 1 Although the pohutukawa does not grow in the South Island, its cousin, the beautiful shining rata, with flowers almost as brilliantly red, flourishes there. In the season the rata turns the whole of the lower slopes of the Southern Alps into a mass of scarlet flame. As the pohutukawa greeted the Maori on his arrival in New Zealand, so it was thought that a pohutukawa tree was the Maori’s last taking-off place when his soul left this earth for the spirit world. On the rugged headland! of Cape Reinga, in the Far North, grew a giant pohutukawa with one great branch hanging over the sea. Having travelled to that spot from all over the country, departing spirits clung to the overhanging branch before taking the final plunge into the dark whirlpool below —into another world. —Original.