PlantFiles: Wollemi Pine, Wollemia
Wollemia nobilis

Got my Wollemi Pine via UPS December, 2006 from National Geographic

The certificate enclosed said I got North America's #15. Don't know if that means I got the fifteenth pine or what. I've been a newsletter subscriber since the 1st issue years ago and I think we got an early ordering opportunity.

The story of its discovery ten years ago, its culturing and eventual world-wide distribution is fascinating.


It stood about 12-15 inches tall 1½ years ago and is now nearly 3 feet tall. I planted it in the ground two weeks ago...seems to be doing well. It came very well packed...National G. got some sort of award for innovative/ecofriendly packaging.

I have been following the story of the wollemi pine since its discovery so I had to own one, despite the fact the wollemi pine is enduring a bit of a fad in Australia at the moment.
I have decided to keep mine in a pot so it can come with me if we ever move. I've had it now for just over a year and it's thriving. It grew from about 30 to 50cm in this time and sprouted abundant, healthy foliage.
The plant is kept in my garden in full sun. I water it about twice a week in summer and once in winter. It seems to respond well to Australian native fertiliser once yearly, some charlie carp every couple of months and some blood and bone now and then.
Last winter a lot of the leaves went brown. Although leaves on this plant can 'surburn' when young I was advised at a nursery that browning can also be caused by lack of nurtrition. Another good dose of fertiliser seems to have remedied this problem.
Last spring, the main leader failed to break through the waxy 'polar cap' that forms on the end of each stem each winter. Another vertical leader sprouted near the top of the original, but after I gently removed the wax with a sharp knife the original leader took off again!
My wollemi takes pride of place in my garden and has fortunately proven to be very hardy.

I bought my Wollemi a few weeks ago at a garden show here in Sydney. For $45 I received a 2 ft tall tree in lovely condition. I repotted it in a good humous soil and decided to keep it in a pot to re use as our Christmas tree in the future. Also I think a little shade will do it good during the 110 degree days of summer.

I have had the pine planted in a container on my patio since December. It has just recently started putting out new growth, but appears to be very happy now in the Mississippi sun.

National Geographic is very proud of their trees (was over $100), but it arrived in good shape and well packaged.

For anyone living in the San Francisco Bay Area wishing to see Wollemi Pines, the UC Botanical Garden at Berkeley planted both of their trees late in 2007 (in the Australasian section of the garden). Both looked to be approximately 18 inches tall as of December.

Well, I think that it will be interesting to see how the cultivation and sale of Wollemia nobilis plays out...

Will it become the next "Cycas revoluta" at every big box store, or will those of us in the USA continue to have no choice but ordering them from National Geographic ? Personally, I would like to see the Wollemi Pine on par with Ginkgo biloba in terms of availability and price.

According to the Wollemi Pine North America Website "The Wollemi™ pine tree was scheduled for national release in the USA through garden centers in Spring 2007, but due to the high level of demand, the launch has been delayed until Summer 2008"....

After much procrastination (and I really do *not* like the fact that Wollemi was registered as a trademark here in the USA), I finally ordered a Wollemi Pine from the Wollemi™ Pine North America Website on 1/5/2008, and it arrived via UPS 2nd Day this week on 1/17.

From what I have read of the experiences of others, I must admit I was a little sceptical, but the tree that arrived was in good shape and looks perfectly healthy.

The tips of the folliage on the lower branches had been trimmed off. Presumably this was done for aesthetic reasons (I suspect that earlier on the tree may have developed a little damage in the tips of the foliage, maybe due to stress. To be honest, having slight damage on the earlier growth would not have bothered me). The more recent growth at the top of the plant looked lush, green and perfectly healthy.

It is 13 inches tall, and was shipped from a nursery in Parrish, Florida (according to the USDA nematode inspection certificate). The potting mixture looks to be sphagnum peat moss and perlite.

I probably have the one of the largest private collections of Wollemia nobilis with over 250 trees both in the USA and Australia.

I was able to obtain export permits from the Australian Government back in August and exported them to several countries.

There are no "exclusive" rights to this plant nor is it "patented" nor is there any restriction on propagation.

The plants being sold by a national magazine are generally of very poor quality and much smaller in size than the advertised size resulting in numerous complaints to NG, WNA and the Federal Trade Commission regarding false and misleading advertising and mail fraud.

The trees I imported to the USA were 20-24" tall and have grown to about 30-36" since August. They were all selected from premium nursery stock in Australia and were not "cut off" as the ones currently being sold here are.

All in all it will be worth waiting for some decent plant stock to be imported which will happen from Asia in a couple of years with the propagation programs going on there and the price will drop to a reasonable level.

BTW WNA trademarked the name "WOLLEMI" in the USA so as to try and stop people from selling the plants.

I was on the 4 month waiting list as well...After I received the first one, I went back to the site and ordered another which only took three days to get after ordering???They must have opened up the flood gates on these little guys...I know for a fact that National G has the exclusive contract only until the end of 2006. Hmmm do you think that has something to do with it?hehe
Has anyone tried to propagate? My leaders are both untouched and i dont plan on hacking those.

Got mine yesterday, too, from the same source, though ordered it about 4 months ago. Still, it looks healthy, and, like the one above, top has been cut off, too. Fingers crossed!!

These have been available in the U. S. A. for some months via the National Geographic Society, at a big markup. It's nearly $100 for the tree, and they charge hefty shipping and in many states a sales tax. I gave in and ordered one for spring delivery, and soon got an e-mail saying that they would ship soon. Yesterday mine arrived via UPS from another town in Florida (Parrish, south of Tampa, rather more to the south of me, from a nursery contracted to raise and ship them). Well-packaged but obviously used as a source for more material -- the leader has been chopped off to be rooted as another tree, and a strong new leader, a tad off-center, has replaced it; not exactly what I'd hope for in an expensive plant, but I don't plan to send it back if it lives and grows.

It looks like a bunya-bunya only with cycad-shaped leaves/needles/whatever. Obviously it is too soon for me to say how well it does in my zone 8b climate. I will have to watch the phosphate (a lot of it in the soil here, maybe too much; I hope that Wollemia is much less fussy about that than Protea and its relatives) and the drainage (none too good on my sand/clay mix with clay underneath).

I received one of these magnificent specimens in March 2006.

It is unfortunate that some misguided individuals, (maybe they should be called eco-vandals), have tried to find the grove of trees in New South Wales, Australia, and have succeded in importing the fungul disease "phytophthora cinnamomi" (which causes dieback) into the area and threatened the whole plantation. Just as well some experts managed to propagate from those that were found.

This remarkable coniferous tree was only discovery as recently as 1994 in a series of narrow, steep sided "rainforest" canyons 150 kilometers north west of the city of Sydney.

The discovery by David Noble, a park ranger of the Wollemi National Park in the Blue Mountains range only occurred because of his adventurous bush-walking/rock climbing abilities in the virtually inaccessible and remote canyon system. Luckily, he had a good knowlege of the plant types and quickly recognised this as something different and worth further investigation.

Returning with a small piece of the tree that he expected someone would be able to identify, it soon proved itself as a new un-classified plant specimen that further study would be needed to establish, especially it's relationship to other conifers. All that was first suspected by the scientists were that it had certain characteristics of the 200 million year old Araucariaceae family, but not quite the same as with any living genera.

Looking at fossil remains of this family of conifers and comparing later obtained specimens of the plant proved this to be the case and it was duly placed into the Araucariaceae somewhere between the still extant genera Agathis and Araucaria, having some characteristics of both, but also some of it's own.

A breeding programe is underway with the first commercial release of this plant worldwide in 2005. It should prove itself to be a valuable tree for ornament, either planted in open ground or for tubs and planters. It is also proving itself to be far more adaptable and cold hardy than it's restricted distribution would suggest.