{"id":2186350,"date":"2026-10-08T21:57:45","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T18:57:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2186350"},"modified":"2026-10-08T21:57:45","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T18:57:45","slug":"the-bizarre-ancient-araucaria-trees-that-populate-one-of-chiles-most-fascinating-ski-regions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=2186350","title":{"rendered":"The Bizarre, Ancient Araucar\u00eda Trees That Populate One of Chile\u2019s Most Fascinating Ski Regions"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Ancient araucar\u00eda trees dot the volcanic landscape of Chile\u2019s Araucan\u00eda region. | Photo: Martin Kuprianowicz<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\n<\/p>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

To see an araucar\u00eda tree, also known as a monkey puzzle tree, is to gaze eyes upon a survivor from the Jurassic period of Planet Earth; these trees have been around for hundreds of million years, since well before Pangea split up.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Chile\"Chile
APEX Backcountry Guides<\/a> owner Forrest Schmidt stands amongst araucaria trees in a powder skiing zone in Araucan\u00eda. | Photo: Martin Kuprianowicz<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Growing along the volcanic slopes of south-central Chile and Argentina, this ancient conifer looks less like a standard pine tree and more like a candidate for an alien landscape or a prehistoric artifact.<\/strong> Its thick, geometric branches radiate outward in symmetrical whorls, covered entirely in stiff, triangular, razor-sharp leaves that overlap like scale armor. Botanists routinely classify the tree as a \u201cliving fossil,\u201d tracing its lineage back over 200 million years to the Early Jurassic period when ancestral Araucar\u00eda<\/em> species dominated the ancient supercontinent of Gondwana. The tree\u2019s menacing, spike-encased foliage is an evolutionary defense mechanism once tailored to deter browsing by long-extinct sauropod dinosaurs.<\/p>\n