Kauri Pine

Kauri Pine, or KOWRIE (Dammaria australis), a species of Dammar (q.v.), a native of New Zealand. It is a tree of great size and beauty, attaining a height of 140 feet or more, with whorls of branches, the lower of which die off as it becomes old. The timber is white, close-grained, durable, flexible, and very valuable for masts, yards, and planks. The Fiji Islands, New Hebrides, and Australia produce other species. All of them are trees of dark, dense foliage, and produce a resin called Kauri Resin, or Kauri Gum, and sometimes Australian Copal and Australian Dammar, of which large quantities are exported from Auckland. It is sometimes found in pieces as large as a child's head, of a dull amber colour, where forests of these trees have formerly grown; and is now known to lie mingled with coal strata of Tertiary age. It is also collected from the trees from which it has newly exuded, and is then of a whitish colour. D. orientalis, a native of the Moluccas, exudes a similar resin, which is at first white like crystal, and is called white dammar, but with age it assumes a yellow amber tint.