Cycads the living fossils of plant world

JOHN MEDLEY WOOD was a 19th Century sailor turned farmer who became curator of the Durban Botanic Gardens in South Africa.

In 1895, he stumbled upon a clump of four strange trees in a forest in KwaZulu Natal. The trees belonged to an ancient fern-like group, known as the cycads and were of a species unknown to science at the time. It was a remarkable discovery; no other Wood’s cycads have been found. Shoots of the trees were taken. They proved easy to cultivate and specimens now grow in botanical gardens worldwide.

In 1907, two of the original trees were removed to Durban and, in 1916, the last surviving trunk was taken into captivity. It died in 1964.