We saw lots of interesting species on our campus walk. One of these was the Bunya Bunya, Araucaria bidwillii, native to Queensland (NE), Australia. Other common names include bunya pine (though it is not a "pine"), and false monkey puzzle tree (it belongs to the same genus and resembles the monkey puzzle tree.) 
A striking feature of this tree are the stems with very sharp, pointed, tough leaves. Could this morphology have helped protect from herbivory in the Mesozoic (age of reptiles) when this tree was widespread?
We also noticed many insects on the bark of the tree. As a couple of our insect-knowledgeable students pointed out, these were likely mealybug eaters, though they looked like mealybugs themselves (the insects, not the students...) Read more about these and the Araucaria genus at waynesworld.palomar.edu. (source of the photo below).
We didn't see any but we talked about the cones of this species The cones are huge - 20–35 cm in diameter (the size of footballs)! They contain large, edible seeds. Because of these large cones, it can be a hazard to be underneath when the cones drop. Check out this article from the ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corp.) "Living under Bunya Pines is not for the faint hearted".
