Below you'll find more than a dozen new native plant pages that have been added to the DOC website.


Edelweiss. Photo: B.Smith.

Alpine plants

A very special and unusual group of plants occupies the harsh alpine zone of New Zealand’s rugged mountains.

Beech tree with lichen.

Beech forest

Find out about New Zealand’s beech forests – the largest remaining indigenous forest type in New Zealand.

Three Kings cabbage tree. Photo: Lisa Forester.

Cabbage tree/tī kōuka

The cabbage tree is one of the most distinctive trees in the New Zealand landscape, especially on farms. They grow all over the country, but prefer wet, open areas like swamps.

Chatham Island forget-me-not.

Chatham Island forget-me-not

The threatened Chatham Island forget-me-not, a much loved, stunning garden plant, grows naturally on the Chatham Islands - on coastal cliffs, rock outcrops and sandy and rocky beaches.

Keketerehe, a plant which grows on the Chatham Islands. Photo: Jeremy Rolfe.

Chatham Islands plants

Find out about the many plants that grow on the Chatham Islands, both native and introduced.

Fern.

Ferns

New Zealand has an unusually high number of fern species for a temperate country and about 40 per cent of these species occur nowhere else in the world.

Fierce lancewood/Pseudopanax ferox, close up of leaves. Photo: Rebecca Stanley.

Lancewood/horoeka

Lancewood, or horoeka, is a unique, small tree with lance-like foliage that changes dramatically as the tree matures.

Close-up of pink manuka flowers. Photo: Ian Flux.

Mānuka/kāhikatoa & kānuka

Although mānuka/kāhikatoa and kānuka have a superficial similarity and are collectively known as ‘tea trees’ they are genetically very distinct from each other.

Matagouri flowers.

Matagouri/wild Irishman

Matagouri, or wild Irishman as it is sometimes called, is a thorny bush or small tree that can grow up to six metres high.

Mount Cook lily, Gertrude Saddle, Fiordland National Park.

Mount Cook lily

The Mount Cook lily is in fact not a lily at all. Learn more about one of New Zealand’s most well known alpine plants.

Nīkau palm trees with berries. Photo: R.Suggate.

Nīkau palm

The nīkau palm is the southernmost member of the palm family and New Zealand's only native palm species.

Pahautea, foliage.

New Zealand cedars/pāhautea & kawaka

Commonly referred to as New Zealand cedars, pāhautea and another species kaikawaka or kawaka, are not true cedars at all.

Flowers of Olearia hectorii. Photo: J Barkla.

Olearia hectorii (Hectors tree daisy)

Olearia Hectorii is one of the most threatenened members of New Zealand's rare, eight-species oleria or small-leaved tree daisy family.

Rainbow over Raglan farmland, showing remaining podocarp forest. Photo: C. Rudge.

Podocarp-hardwood forests

Podocarp trees, such as rimu, kahikatea, miro, mataī and tōtara, boast a lineage that stretches back to the time when New Zealand was part of the super continent of Gondwana.