The New Zealand Plant Conservation Network

Tawatawa reserve has one original kohekohe. Whilst it produces a good number of flowers there are no new trees in the surrounding area. As I understand it the plant itself doesn't produce male/female flowers, hence the lack of offspring. We like the idea of having the gene's of this original tree being retained in the reserve. Whilst others have been planted in the reserve they are a long way off flowering, and current plantings at least 200-300 meters away. So our left field thinking is to manually pollinate the flowers. Would any other flowering kohekohe do? or are the flowers male/female? Has any one done anything similar and can offer any advice.

This could be an interesting extension to the seed collection permit!

There are male and female trees - http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.617.3930&rep=rep1&type=pdf

Firstly you need to check whether the tree you have is male of female. Male trees tend to flower more prolifically with longer racemes (the 'twig' that the flowers are attached to) than female trees, the difference can be up to 1m for males and 40cm for females. Male trees can sometimes produce a few fruit. If it is a male tree then you will probably need to take the flowers to a female tree elsewhere to pollinate. Or take cuttings of 'your' tree and plant those around and introduce seedlings from elsewhere with the long term aim that they will eventually cross pollinate.