Species
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Araucaria columnaris (J.R.Forst.) Hook.

Cook Island Pine, Cook pine, Cook's Pine, Cook's araucaria

Climate known 61 photographs
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Every figure on this page is derived from public data by a stated rule and says its source; nothing here is written by a person or a model, except the Wikipedia passage, which is quoted and marked as such. How it is made.

Summary

Araucaria columnaris, the coral reef araucaria, Cook pine, New Caledonia pine, Cook araucaria, or columnar araucaria, is a species of conifer in the family Araucariaceae.

Text from Wikipedia, “Araucaria columnaris”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written. Kept separate from everything derived here.

About the genus · Araucaria

Araucaria is a genus of evergreen coniferous trees in the family Araucariaceae. While today they are largely confined to the Southern Hemisphere, during the Jurassic and Cretaceous they were globally distributed. There are 20 extant species in New Caledonia, eastern Australia, New Guinea, Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Uruguay.

Text from Wikipedia, “Araucaria”, CC BY-SA 4.0, quoted as written.

Family
Araucariaceae
Described by
(J.R.Forst.) Hook.
Native to
New Caledonia
Wild records
135 in range· 59 open

At a glance

Warmest month
27°C
Feb, mean day; nights 24 °C (CHELSA)
Rain
1734mm/yr
12 wet months · peak Mar 262 mm (CHELSA)
Light
20–43DLI
mol/m²/day, winter to summer, open sky (CHELSA shortwave)
In short condensed by rule from the cultivation cards · not written by a person
Rain rule: a summer growing season, June to December in the northern hemisphere (December to June at the habitat, southern). Habitat rain 1734 mm a year, wettest March at 262 mm, driest September at 76 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere). Open sky over the habitat: 20 to 43 mol/m²/day. Cold floor 18.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).
Each sentence is one card's own one-line form, written by the same rule as the card (Its year, Rain, Light, Temperature); the note cannot say what a card does not. Months are given for the northern hemisphere (set your site in Settings to change this), and the habitat's own alongside. The cards · the figures.

Also known as Araucaria cookii R.Br. ex D.Don; Araucaria cookii R.Br. ex Endl.; Araucaria excelsa (Lamb.) R.Br.; Araucaria excelsa (Lamb.) W.T.Aiton; Araucaria intermedia R.Br. and 16 more.

Cultivation

Its year Rain rule: a summer growing season, June to December in the northern hemisphere (December to June at the habitat, southern).

This species’ habitat figures, and what two fixed rules read from them.

The rain rule reads a summer growing season: 70% of the year's rain (1302 mm of 1734 mm) falls in December to June, warmer than the year (wet-season mean 24.1 °C against a yearly mean of 22.9 °C). Months are the habitat's, southern hemisphere; shifted six months for a northern-hemisphere collection: June to December.

Read from the median year of CHELSA monthly rainfall and mean temperature across the envelope cells: the rain rule takes the smallest set of months carrying 70% of the rain and calls it winter when its mean is more than half a degree below the year's, summer when more than that above, and neither in between; the temperature rule, used only under 120 mm, names the cooler six months when they are at least a degree cooler than the other six. Months are shifted for the other hemisphere only where the temperature curve gives a season to reverse. A reading of the curves, not an observation of the plant.

Rain Habitat rain 1734 mm a year, wettest March at 262 mm, driest September at 76 mm (habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

1734 mm a year at the habitat, 1302 mm of it December to June. Wettest month March at 262 mm, driest September at 76 mm. Across the envelope cells the year's total runs 1208 mm to 2535 mm (10th to 90th percentile of each cell's own year) (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; habitat calendar, southern hemisphere).

CHELSA monthly precipitation, median year across the envelope cells. The rain that falls where the species is recorded; nothing about how the plant takes water.

Light Open sky over the habitat: 20 to 43 mol/m²/day.

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Open sky over the habitat: 20 to 43 mol/m²/day across the year (daily light integral, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA; the lowest 10th-percentile month across the cells is 20, the highest 90th-percentile month 45).

CHELSA shortwave radiation at each envelope cell, a daily-mean flux taken to a daily total and converted at 2.07 mol of PAR per MJ. The sky over the habitat, measured; what reaches a plant under a rock, a shrub or a shade cloth is not.

Warmth and air Cold floor 18.1 °C (1st-percentile habitat night, NASA POWER).

This species’ habitat figures, with their source.

Temperature

Coldest: the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell is 18.1 °C, the absolute minimum 15.7 °C, no frost in 44 years (NASA POWER daily minima). Warmest: the 99th-percentile day is 28.4 °C. Monthly means: coldest night 18.8 °C in August (across the envelope cells 14.9 °C to 20.3 °C), warmest day 26.9 °C in February (median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). Cold floor: 18.1 °C, which is the 1st-percentile night over 44 years at the typical cell (NASA POWER).

NASA POWER daily minima and maxima 1981–2024 at the typical cell, lapse-corrected to its elevation; CHELSA monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA. The cold floor is the figure named in its sentence. Not a measured survival limit for any plant in a pot.

Humidity

Relative humidity at the habitat: 59 to 65% across the year (monthly means, median year across the envelope cells, CHELSA). A figure about the air, saying nothing about how the plant takes water.

CHELSA relative humidity, median year across the envelope cells.

The figures the cards read from are in Climate below, and where they came from in Natural habitat.

Climate across the habitat

Habitat climate through the yearMean day from 21 °C in Aug to 27 °C in Feb; mean night from 19 °C in Aug to 24 °C in Feb. The cold quarter, Jul to Sep, is the three months around the coldest night. 1734 mm of rain a year, most in Mar. The bands show the 10th to 90th percentile across 66 habitat cells. Over 44 years at the typical cell the absolute minimum was 15.7 °C and the 99th-percentile day 28.4 °C; neither is dated to a month. Beneath: daily light integral and relative humidity through the year, each on its own scale.10°15°20°25°30°28.4° 99th-percentile day (undated)15.7° lowest night in 44 yrs (undated)°C · day and nightcold quarter0100200300400500mm rainDLI 20–43RH 59–65 %JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
day night rain 10th–90th percentile across 66 habitat cells cold quarter: the three months around the coldest night extremes over 44 years at the typical cell, marked at the edge: undated DLI, mol/m²/dayRH %each on its own scale
Figures by month
JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDec
Day °C27 / 26–2827 / 26–2826 / 26–2725 / 24–2624 / 23–2523 / 21–2321 / 20–2321 / 20–2222 / 21–2423 / 22–2525 / 23–2726 / 25–28
Night °C24 / 21–2524 / 22–2524 / 21–2523 / 20–2422 / 18–2320 / 17–2219 / 15–2119 / 15–2019 / 16–2120 / 17–2222 / 19–2323 / 20–24
Rain mm201 / 148–305243 / 170–362262 / 211–405161 / 112–242141 / 101–197132 / 89–16594 / 62–12288 / 66–12776 / 36–9776 / 40–12198 / 69–160162 / 112–256
DLI41 / 39–4338 / 36–4033 / 32–3529 / 28–3123 / 22–2520 / 20–2222 / 21–2327 / 26–2835 / 34–3540 / 39–4142 / 40–4343 / 41–45
RH %64 / 62–6865 / 63–6965 / 63–7063 / 61–6861 / 59–6661 / 58–6659 / 56–6359 / 56–6360 / 58–6360 / 58–6361 / 59–6463 / 61–66

Each figure is the median across the 66 grid cells holding the 129 in-range records, with the 10th–90th percentile span across those cells after the slash where it differs. Extremes and elevation were read at the typical cell 2247:6938 (-22.375, 166.925). Over 44 years there: absolute minimum 15.7 °C, 1st-percentile night 18.1 °C, 99th-percentile day 28.4 °C. Normals: CHELSA V2.1 1981–2010 climatology, 0.05° cells (each the mean of ~36 1 km pixels). Envelope: median and 10th–90th percentile of each month across the 66 distinct grid cells holding the 129 in-range records; extremes and elevation at the typical cell 2247:6938 (its coldest month's mean night nearest the median across cells); its position is the cell centre. Extremes: NASA POWER (MERRA-2) daily 1981–2024, cell -22.50_166.875, lapse-corrected +33 m at 6.5 °C/km. Elevation: ETOPO 2022, 73 m (cell mean).

Natural habitat

Native range as published by WCVP; the marker is where the records are densest and decides nothing: the climate was read across every in-range record's cell, not at the marker.
Openly licensed records inside the range, framed on where they fall.
NativeNew Caledonia· introduced: Sicilia, Ascension, Comoros, Assam, Tokelau-Manihiki, Cook Is., Tubuai Is.
Kew's description“tree” · “wet tropical”· quoted from WCVP, RBG Kew (CC BY 4.0); not derived here
Map marker-22.241, 167.018 · in the densest population, 126 records (93% of those in range)
Evidence usedThe map marker and the climate envelope rest on all 135 georeferenced records inside the native range; the map shows only the 59 openly licensed ones, which alone would put the marker 6 km away. 1139 records outside the range (gardens, roadsides, misidentifications) ignored. 6 in-range records are placed to worse than 10 km and stay on the map but off the climate.
The map markerthe map marker: the openly licensed record nearest the middle of the densest 1° population of the 135 in-range records; it decides nothing.

Photographs

Araucaria columnarisAraucaria columnarisAraucaria columnarisAraucaria columnarisAraucaria columnarisAraucaria columnarisAraucaria columnarisAraucaria columnaris

Photographs: (c) Sagnik Dutta Roy, some rights reserved (CC BY) (3); (c) Dominik Maximilián Ramík, some rights reserved (CC BY) (2); (c) florawhite, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Kevin Faccenda, some rights reserved (CC BY); (c) Thorsten Hackbarth, some rights reserved (CC BY).

Photographs: iNaturalist and Wikimedia Commons did not answer when this page was built; what is shown came from the sources that did.

Papers naming this species

Works whose title or abstract names Araucaria columnaris, most cited first, from OpenAlex (CC0). A mention, not a cultivation source: nothing on this page is drawn from them.

Conifers as invasive aliens: a global survey and predictive framework
David M. Richardson, Marcel Rejmánek (2004) · Diversity and Distributions
Seed Priming: New Comprehensive Approaches for an Old Empirical Technique
Stanley Lutts, Paolo Benincasa, Łukasz Wojtyla, Szymon Kubala (2016) · InTech eBooks
A review of dipterocarps: taxonomy, ecology and silviculture
S. Appanah, Turnbull J.W., eds (1998) · Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) eBooks
Faster returns on ‘leaf economics’ and different biogeochemical niche in invasive compared with native plant species
Josep Peñuelas, Jordi Sardans, Joan Llusià, Susan M. Owen (2009) · Global Change Biology
Production and preservation of resins – past and present
Leyla J. Seyfullah, Christina Beimforde, Jacopo Dal Corso, Vincent Perrichot (2018) · Biological reviews/Biological reviews of the Cambridge Philosophical Society
Le référentiel taxonomique Florical et les caractéristiques de la flore vasculaire indigène de la Nouvelle-Calédonie
Philippe Morat, Tanguy Jaffré, Frédéric Tronchet, Jérôme Munzinger (2012) · Adansonia
Phylogenetic Analysis of Araucariaceae: Integrating Molecules, Morphology, and Fossils
Ignacio H. Escapa, Santiago A. Catalano (2013) · International Journal of Plant Sciences
Innovative approaches to the preservation of forest trees
Hugh W. Pritchard, Justin Moat, João Baptista Silva Ferraz, Timothy R. Marks (2014) · Forest Ecology and Management
Identifying the early genetic consequences of habitat degradation in a highly threatened tropical conifer, Araucaria nemorosa Laubenfels
Chris J. Kettle, Peter M. Hollingsworth, Tanguy Jaffré, Bruce Moran (2007) · Molecular Ecology
Hosts of Colletotrichum
Pedro Talhinhas (2023) · Mycosphere
Seed Longevity—The Evolution of Knowledge and a Conceptual Framework
Jayanthi Nadarajan, Christina Walters, Hugh W. Pritchard, Daniel Ballesteros (2023) · Plants

Similar habitat climate the 6 species whose habitat climate is nearest this one's: mean day and night, month by month, and rain on a log scale, in calendar order, so a habitat with the same seasons six months out is far, not near. Nothing else counts: not range, not family.

Other Araucaria 5 in the reference

History & registers

Where this page came from built 2026-09-20 · dossier v2 · node
gbif.species answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.synonyms answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
gbif.vernacular answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (offline re-derivation; the backbone was not asked)
wcvp.distribution answered
gbif.occurrences answeredGBIF occurrence download https://doi.org/10.15468/dl.3h4zam
climate answered
wikidata answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
wikipedia answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.taxon not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive)
inat.photos.wild answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped
inat.photos.cultivated nothing to reportcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
commons not askedcarried from build of 2026-09-20 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive); that build: carried from build of 2026-09-19 (rederive)
gbif.media answered
openalex answeredcarried from build of 2026-09-20; this build: skipped

Every upstream is recorded as having answered, reported nothing, or refused. Only “nothing to report” is ever shown as an absence. Records came from 93 datasets via GBIF.org; each carries its own licence.