Cook Pine Araucaria columnaris

Cook pine grows as a narrow, almost telegraph-pole column, holding short branchlets tight against a straight trunk instead of spreading them into the wide tiers of its Norfolk Island relative. The characteristic that gives it away is the lean: mature trees tilt noticeably, and that tilt is a species trait rather than wind damage or a staking failure. It is a landmark tree for large coastal gardens, esplanade planting and resort landscapes, and it doubles as a tall windbreak on exposed sandy sites.

Cook pine needs a warm coast

Full sun, free-draining sandy soil and salt-laden wind are the conditions it grew up with in New Caledonia, and it repays them. Along the Queensland coast, through the northern rivers of New South Wales and in warm frost-free pockets further south it settles in without fuss, asks little water once away, and shrugs off exposure that shreds other feature trees. Plant it high where the ground stays wet after rain. Give it space on every side as well: this is a long-term canopy tree that eventually clears everything near it, and mature specimens drop heavy cones and shed branchlet litter, so keep it away from pools, glass roofs, narrow footpaths and neighbouring rooflines.

The one real failure mode is climate. Cook pine is not cold hardy. Frost burns the growing tip, and cold wet winter soil kills young trees outright, which is why plantings in cold inland districts and southern hill country limp along for a few seasons and then fail. If your site gets regular frosts, this is the wrong araucaria for it.

Cook pine or Norfolk Island pine

Plenty of Cook pines are bought and planted as Norfolk Island Pine - Araucaria heterophylla, and the difference shows up years later. Heterophylla builds a broad, evenly tiered cone with soft incurved needles and stands dead upright; columnaris stays narrow, carries stiffer awl-shaped foliage that is darker and harder in texture, and leans. Take the Norfolk where you want the classic symmetrical beach silhouette and where winters run cooler. Take the Cook pine where the site is warm, the space is narrow and the tilt reads as character rather than a defect. For a slim evergreen vertical in a cold or dry inland garden neither is right, and Italian Cypress - Cupressus sempervirens Glauca is the better call.

Leave the leader alone

Cook pine needs almost no pruning, and what it does get should never include the leader. Remove the top and the tree cannot replace it, because araucarias do not reshoot from bare wood, so you are left with a permanently disfigured crown. Take dead lower tiers off flush with the trunk once they brown, and do that work in the warmer months when wounds close quickly. Feed young trees in spring with a slow-release fertiliser, and on pure coastal sand include trace elements, since iron and manganese leach away fast and new growth pales without them. Browse more in feature trees.

Choosing a size

This plant is available in 3 sizes, from 100L up to 400L, priced from $709.00 to $3829.00 per plant. The size shown is the pot the plant arrives in, which is the rootball, not the height of the plant. Every size here is established stock rather than a starter plant, so this line is intended for immediate effect rather than for growing on. Not sure which to choose? Read our guide to Australian native trees.