Spitfire Tree

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The Spitfire Tree is a fictional plant created for the film The Future is Wild. The spitfire tree inhabits the tropical rainforests of Antarctica 100 million year from now. The ancestor of this tree is never given. All that is provided is it evolved from elsewhere and dispersed into Antarctica the same way as modern trees colonize the Pacific islands. The spitfire tree has a stout trunk and frond-like leaves sproting from single stalks. Flowers cover the surface of the trunk. Unlike most flowering plants, the spitfire tree has separate male and female flowers.

The spitfire tree sparks the evolution of other species of wildlife. The spitfire bird is a flutterbird that pollenates the tree. In return, the tree collects pools of highly reactive chemicals that explode in a corrosive acid when mixed (hence the separate male and female flowers). The spitfire bird collects both chemicals to spray at attackers, like the falconfly. To counter this evolution, the Spitfire Beetle imitates these flowers and attacks spitfire birds before they could spray acid.

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