Big trees that make you say, "It's like a giant bonsai"

Shibui · Dec 27, 2023

That bark pattern is called Minni Ritchi. A number of species from a range of genera have developed similar bark pattern so a pic of just the bark is not very useful for id.

Hard to narrow down the species from that pic as the foliage is not shown clearly but could possibly be one of the Hakeas though I'm not sure if any of that family have minni ritchi bark.
Several WA eucs have this bark but the foliage appears to be a bit narrow for any Eucs.
There's a few Acacias with similar bark - Acacia curranii, A. cyperophilla, A. delibrata, A. gracillima, A. grasbii, A. monticola, rhodophylla, A. trachycarpa. Most of those have narrow phylodes that look very much like needles.
I also know that one Allocasuarina has minni ritchi bark but it's from Eastern states - Allocasuarina inophloia.

WA is a big parcel of land. Knowing where these are growing will narrow down the possibilities, as will a good shot of the foliage, growth pattern and/or flowers.

fredman · Dec 28, 2023

I would like to think this happened naturally.
Pohutukawa (NZ Christmas tree) growing inside a dead and hollow Monterey cypress

Another smaller one a few meters away.

leatherback · Dec 29, 2023

Shibui said:
That bark pattern is called Minni Ritchi. A number of species from a range of genera have developed similar bark pattern so a pic of just the bark is not very useful for id.

Hard to narrow down the species from that pic as the foliage is not shown clearly but could possibly be one of the Hakeas though I'm not sure if any of that family have minni ritchi bark.
Several WA eucs have this bark but the foliage appears to be a bit narrow for any Eucs.
There's a few Acacias with similar bark - Acacia curranii, A. cyperophilla, A. delibrata, A. gracillima, A. grasbii, A. monticola, rhodophylla, A. trachycarpa. Most of those have narrow phylodes that look very much like needles.
I also know that one Allocasuarina has minni ritchi bark but it's from Eastern states - Allocasuarina inophloia.

WA is a big parcel of land. Knowing where these are growing will narrow down the possibilities, as will a good shot of the foliage, growth pattern and/or flowers.

Thx @Shibui this was somewhere between Carnarvon and Kalbarri NP, Shark Bay region.
The foliage certainly did not contain segments as you would expect with allocasuarina. I took them for needles, and decided they had to be pines, never thought about acacia with very narrow leaves!. Very localized, so there were a few stretches with a few KM with these trees, but we only saw them in two consecutive days, so one area, in a 4855km roadtrip.