Introduction
Tavahi ~ Tavai, Rhus taitiensis
Tawai ~ Tawhai in Aotearoa
Lophozonia menziesii, Tawai ~ Tawhai, "Silver beech".
Fuscospora fusca, Tawai ~ Tawhai, Tawhai raunui, Hutu "Red beech"
Fuscospora truncata, Tawai raunui, Hutu, Hututawai, "Hard beech"
Fuscospora solandri, Tawhai rauriki, "Black beech"
Fuscospora cliffortioides, Tawhai rauriki "Mountain beech"
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This name probably originated while the Autronesian explorers were journeying through the Bismarck Archipelago off the north coast of Papua New Guinea. This tree is native also to the Philippines, but does not seem to have been important enough there to have been given a name in any except one of the 90 or more local languages (the exception is Bagobo in southern Mindanao, where it is called biro or (along with another tree) magasorod. Its Tahitian name looks odd -- one would expect Tavai rather than 'āvai, but this aberration probably results from the Tahitian custom of changing words after death of ariki whose name incorporated them -- sometimes the old word was revived later, sometimes forgotten. In the case of Tavai vs 'āvai it may have been partly remembered from its alternate form 'āpape (pape has largely replaced vai in Tahiti as the word for water). Its application to the southern beech trees in Aotearoa may have been inspired by the old leaves of Furcospora fusca turning bright red before falling in the spring as the new leaves replace them, just as the leaves of the tropical Tavai turn bright red before falling.
Tavahi ~ Tavai, Rhus taitiensis
 This shrub is native to Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines and Oceania, except the Cook Islands and the Marquesas (a related species is native to Hawai'i). It grows up to 30 metres tall, with a cylindrical trunk often with butresses. It is a forest tree growng from sea level to about 2,000 metres, and is among the pioneer plants in cleared areas; it is a dominant tree in secondary forests in Samoa.
The tree has a rough, mottled brown outer bark with a smooth pinkish inner bark and a milky sap. The wood is cream coloured. The leaves consist of 7-13 pairs of tapering leaflets 4 - 20 cm long, reddish in clour when young, with pointed or rounded tips. The tree is deciduous, and the leaves turn bright red when about to fall -- a parallel with one of its namesakes in Aotearoa, Fuscospora fusca, whose old leaves turn red and are shed in Spring as the new leaves appear. In the flowering season the tree is covered with many-flowered panicles of tiny pinkish flowers; male and female flowers appear on separate trees. The fruit is a shiny black drupe 3-5 mm in diameter. The seed has a tough coating (like kōwhai), and soaking in hot water aids germination. Interestingly, the water the seeds are soaked in is said to make a nice, lemony flavoured drink.
Tavai is not a particularly useful tree because of the indifferent quality of its wood, although in Samoa and elsewhere it is occasionally used for making canoes and packing cases, and also for fuel. In New Ireland, Papua New Guinea, the whitish wood was used for fishing floats, and in New Hanover (PNG) young women apparently chewed the new shoots to induce abortions. Its real claim to fame however rests in the leaves, which combined with various plant-based ingredients and other materials have been widely used to produce black dyes, for colouring hair, painting canoes, and dying pandanus and probably other materials used for weaving. In some Melanesian communities they are mixed with a powdered rock to produce and indelible lustrous black dye for colouring teeth.
Tawai ~ Tawhai in Aotearoa
The trees which have inherited this name in Aotearoa are true "Ghosts of Gondwana", plants whose ancestry can be traced back to the time Aotearoa was still part of the giant southern continent. The group as a whole can be traced back to ancestors living here 135 million years ago; Lophozonia menziesii's ancestry goes back directly 70-100 milion years, and the Fuscospora group about 60 million years. They have related species in Australia and South America, and also in New Caledonia and New Guinea. They tend to dominate cool climate forests on land with low fertility. These forests are characterized by fewer species, sparse forest floors covered with mosses rather than the larger ferns and climbers of the Podocarp forests, along with an abundance filmy ferns and astelias on trees and rocks, and (in wet environments) lichens.
The Fuscospora species are prone to shedding old leaves as the new ones appear in spring, and those of F. fusca in particular turn bright red at this time. This may provide the link between these trees and their tropical Polynesian namesakes. The brilliant leaves along with the crimson anthers (pollen-bearing parts) of the male flowers, along with the red sap and wood, are also remnants of the blood splashed around in the forest during Maui's epic battle with Tunanui (see the page for Pirita for a brief account of this event).
 The Fuscospora species, especially the Tawhai rauriki, F. solandri and F. cliffortioides, are also hosts to two ingenious scale insects, Ultracoelostoma assimile (found mainly on the higher parts of the tree) and U. brittini (found on the trunks and larger branches), which feed on their sap by penetrating the tissue under the bark. The insect sucks the sap up and excretes the excess sugar through a delicate waxy anal filament (as illustrated on the left). The drops of honeydew landing on the bark feed a variety of fungi and the sooty mould (Capnodium sp.), along with a host of insects and nectar-eating birds like the tui and korimako. Included in these unfortunately since the mid-twentieth century has been the introduced "Waikato wasp", Vespula vulgaris. It is estimated that beech forests produce about 3,500 kilos of sugar per hectare, up to 90% of which may be consumed by these wasps, leaving only the insect-eating birds like the pīwakawaka to get a decent meal. Honeydew honey, produced by bees foraging on the sticky, honeydew saturated mould when wasps can be controlled, has become an esteemed export product, with higher levels of potassium than other honeys, along with minerals, trace elements, and antioxidants including polyphenol (said to provide protection from free radicals). This honey contains complex sugars which resist or prevent crystalization, and may have "prebiotic" qualities, aiding digestion.
In books on New Zealand trees published before 2013, these trees will all have been placed in the genus Nothofagus, which itself was usually treated as a member of the same family as the European beech trees, the Fagaceae. In their 2013 paper on the genus, Peter Heenan and Rob Smissen reviewed the genetic and taxonomic evidence, and recognized four genera (Fuscospora, with 6 species in Aotearoa, Tasmania and southern South America; Lophozonia, with 7 species, in Aotearoa, Australia, and southern South America), Nothofagus (with 5 species in southern South America), and Trisyngyne, with 25 species in New Guinea (Indonesia and PNG) and New Caledonia (see the bibliography for publication details). They also confirmed that these trees were sufficiently different from the European beeches to warrant their being placed in a separate family, the Nothofagaceae ("false beeches"). The New Zealand species are confined to the North and South Islands; none occur naturally on the Chatham or Stewart Islands.
Male kiwis build nesting burrows in which the female can deposit their super-sized eggs (about 12 x 8 cm) which the male in some species or both parents in others will incubate until the chick hatches -- generally in about 10-12 weeks. These nests are often dug under the roots of large trees, including tawai. In Ngā Mōteatea there is a plaintive soliloquy in which the composer compares herself to a kiwi chick hatching to find itself imprisoned by the tawai roots which have grown over and around it while the parents have been away (the bird doing the incubating often left the nest abandoned temporarily to forage for food, and it was widely thought that after the egg was laid the parents just left it unattended until it was about to hatch). The tītī (Puffinus griseus) is normally a sea bird, but before the arrival of the Norway rat it was seasonally abundant in the ranges near Waikaremoana where the composer lived, abandoned by her family.
Engari te tītī e tangi haere ana, ē
Whai tokorua rawa rāua;
Tēnā ko au nei, e manu ē,
Kei te hua kiwi i mahue i te tawai;
Ka toro he rākau kai runga, ē,
Ka hoki mai ki te pao,
Ka whai uri ki ahau.
Fortunate the tītī as it cries in its flight,
It has the company of its mate;
As for me, my bird, I am like
The egg, abandoned by the kiwi at the tawai roots.
They spread and embrace it;
When the mother returns for the hatching,
The progeny is such as I.
[He Tangi Mokemoke, nā Mihikitekapua (Ngati Ruapani, Tuhoe) - NM Pt1, 18, lines 1-7
Translation by Pei te Hurinui Jones.]
Lophozonia menziesii, Tawai ~ Tawhai, "Silver beech".
 This is the archetypical Tawai, as it does not have a qualifier or alternative name. It is also unique botanically, as it does not hybridize, can be traced back in the fossil record longer than any of the others, and also is host to the "strawberry fungus", Cyttaria gunnii (illustrated in the gallery below), which is also associated with some Tasmanian and South American species. The tree grows to about 30 metres high, and is found in montane forests from Northern Waikato south (but not in Taranaki), descending to sea level in the south of the South Island. The trunk is up to 2 metres in diameter, and is buttressed at the base. The bark is silvery-grey, especially on young trees and trees exposed to light. The tree has small thick rounded dark-green leaves with indentations (deeper and shallower ones alternating) spaced along the margins. They vary from 5 to 18mm wide and are slightly longer than wide. They are produced abundantly on the branchlets -- this is a very leafy tree! Unlike the Fuscospora species, this Tawai does not shed its old leaves en masse in Spring. The reddish-pink or green flowers appear in late spring and summer, individually inconspicuous but combine to give some colour to the tree. They produce seed capsules with glandular hairs. The seeds mature in mid summer and autumn. It has a deep red wood which has been used for making furniture, however, unlike the timber from Fuscospora species, it is not very suitable for outdoor use. Also unlike the other members of this family, this species resists the scale insects which cause the other souhern beech trees to become black with sooty mould. However, as noted above it is the host to the Cyttaria strawberry fungus, which infects the upper branches of some trees; when the infestation becomes severe the tree sheds the infected portion, which can give the crowns of some trees a scraggly appearance. This tree is also a favourite host for the Pirita (mistletoe), Peraxilla colensoi.
Fuscospora fusca, Tawai ~ Tawhai, Tawhai raunui, Hutu "Red beech"
 This is another large tree, also reaching 30m in height, with a trunk 2 metres or more in diameter, often with a buttressed base. The bark of young trees is pale and smooth, turning grey and becoming rough and furrowed as the tree matures. The tree grows in lowland and montane forests from Waikato south. It has a very strong, durable timber which is easily worked. The red wood is compact grained and has been used in furniture manufacture.
It has thin, leathery ovate leaves 2-4 cm long by 1.5 to 2.5 cm wide and sharply toothed. The leaves on young trees turn red in colder weather, and on mature trees the old trees turn bright red before they are shed in spring when the new leaves replace them. This may have inspired the explorers who first encountered them to name them after the tropical tavai, although their leaves are very different in shape and size. Both trees are also associated with black dye. In the case of the New Zealand tawai it is obtained from the bark rather than the leaves.
The male and female flowers are carried on separate trees. The male inflorescences have 1 to 5 greenish-yellow flowers, the female 3. The fruits are winged nuts about 7 mm long. This species frequently hybridizes with both Fuscospora solandri and F. cliffortioides. The tree is comparatively fast growing, increasing its height by an average of about 25 cm a year.
Fuscospora truncata, Tawai raunui, Hutu, Hututawai, "Hard beech"
 This is a tall tree, reaching 30 metres with the tunk often buttressed at the base and up to 2 metres in diameter. It has a greyish-black bark, often covered with sooty black mould because of infestations of scale insects. It is rich in tannin, and has been used for tanning leather. This tree is found in lowland and montane forest from sea level to 900 metres, from Kaitaia to the north of the South Island, as far south as Westport in the west. The wood is particularly hard and durable, and has been used for railway sleepers, bridges, wharf piles and poles. The wood is red when freshly cut, and dries to a light brown colour.
The leaves are coarsely and bluntly toothed, with petioles about 3 mm long. The leaves are a little snmaller than those of F. fusca, with more teeth (8 -12 pairs of blunt serrations) and no domatia (little pits in the leaf surface -- F. fusca usually has two on each leaf). They are shiny green above and pale underneath, with conspicuous veins. The tree usually sheds the old leaves when the new ones appear in the Spring. The male flowers are greenish red with yellow or bright red stamens, 1 to 3 flowers in each inflorescence and up to 10 inflorescences on each branchlet. The female inflorescences have 3 flowers and up to 5 on a branchlet. The seed-like fruit are up to 8 mm long.
Fuscospora solandri, Tawhai rauriki, "Black beech"
 This tree is not as tall as its larger-leaved cousins, but reaches 25 metres in favourable conditions nonetheless. The trunk is up to a metre or more in diameter and, like the other species, often buttressed. The tree grows in forests from south of East Cape to South Canterbury, except in Taranaki, from sea level to about 800 metres. It dominates the landscape in montane areas in parts of the South Island.
The branchlets are downy, with short golden hairs. The bark is black, smooth on young trees and furrowed on older ones. The trunk and lower branches are usually covered with a gooey black mould resulting from the activity of the Ultracoelostoma scale insects. The yellow or yellowy-red wood is streaked black, but is not durable unless from very old trees.
The tree has leathery oblong tapered shiny leaves, 10-15mm by 5-10 mm on short petioles, smooth and dark green above, with a flattened, greyish down below. The male inflorescence comprises one or two flowers, 1 to 4 per branchlet, with bright or dark red anthers. The tree blooms profusely, giving the whole tree a distinctively red appearance. The female inflorescence consists of 1-3 tiny flowers, one or two per branchlet. The seeds are nuts about 7 mm long.
Fuscospora cliffortioides, Tawhai rauriki "Mountain beech"
 This tree was described as a separate species in the nineteenth century, but more recently had been regarded as a distinctive variety of Fuscospora (then Nothofagus) solandri. Peter Heenan and Rod Smissen in their 2013 paper (see above) restored it to the status of a separate species in the light of both DNA and morphological evidence.
This is the shortest member of the family, reaching only 15 metres, with a trunk a little less than a metre in diameter, and near the treeline becoming a much shorter shrub; it can be a canopy tree at lower altitudes. The tree grows mainly from the Volcanic Plateau in the central North Island south, in montane and subalpine environments to about 1300 m, coming down to sea level in the far south of the South Island. It is not found in Taranaki or the Tararua ranges near Wellington. The tree is the favourite host of two species of mistletoe: Peraxilla tetrapetala and Alepis flavida (see the page on Pirita for more information).
The branches of these trees spread outward in tiers. The leaves are thick and leathery with smooth margins, 10-15 mm long by 7-10 mm wide, tapering at the tips and rounded at the base. The undersides are densely covered with white hairs. The flowers are small (the female ones are minute), but the bright red male flowers along with the new growth give a reddish hue to the whole tree during the flowering season in the Spring.
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