Living Cathedrals: The World’s Largest Trees by Canopy Area

#FloraAndFaunaFriday from Lord Howe Island.

Stand beneath a Lord Howe banyan fig and the forest becomes a vaulted cathedral. Ficus macrophylla subsp. columnaris is an island relative of the Moreton Bay fig. And it has a true banyan habit of dropping aerial roots. But here on Lord Howe, it also drops extra trunks which start small and narrow, but thicken into columns and allow the tree to slowly “walk” across the forest floor, building living, many-pillared rooms of green light.

Some of Lord Howe’s banyans are over a thousand years old. Banyans hold the global record for the largest tree canopies on Earth. And on Lord Howe, individual trees can cover about a hectare. When we say “largest in the world”, we mean the banyan way of growing: a single organism spreading laterally, knitting itself into a vast network across the forest. These trees are my favourite species on the island. There’s something so special about them.

Their roots and multiple trunks don’t just impress - they engineer a microclimate. They brace the tree, spread weight, and cast deep shade that damps heat and holds moisture. They even buffer boulder falls from the mountains: one part of a banyan can be damaged, yet the organism survives. Walk the Valley of the Shadows and you’ll find limbs covering great swathes of ground, cooling the air, sheltering seedlings, and feeding birds and insects with figs. Architecture and habitat in one organism.

Botanically, the Lord Howe banyan tree is special: an endemic island form of Ficus macrophylla that leans even more strongly into the column-forming, multi-trunked style than its mainland cousins. Those “walking” roots aren’t a trick of perspective; they’re a growth and survival strategy. Each investment decision made trunk by trunk buttresses against wind, drought and boulder falls, and claims ground gently but inexorably.

A small island asks for small courtesies. If you visit Lord Howe, clean your boots for biosecurity, stay on paths, don’t climb or carve the roots, and please support local conservation that keeps these cathedrals standing. The payoff is immediate: cooler air under the crown, birds working the figs, and that special feeling of being inside a living cathedral.

I’ll share more island notes in coming days. For today’s #FloraAndFaunaFriday, look up: the largest canopies in the plant world belong to banyans. And on Lord Howe they’re still building, growing and breathing every day.

Lord Howe Island’s banyan fig trees can grow to over one hectare in area.