Ironwood pines

A stand of Ironwood Pines was typically far taller than any surrounding trees in the Deepwoods.

Ironwood pines were massive pine trees found in the Deepwoods. Their wood was extremely heavy and strong, and kernels from within their massive pinecones were edible. They tended to grow in groups, like the Ironwood Stands.

Structure

Ironwood Pines grew in distinctive spurts. For perhaps fifty years, the trunks of the trees would expand and grow higher, and then the tree would spend the next few decades growing a ring of large branches. The cycle would then repeat itself. As a result, Ironwood Pines were colossal, straight trees with distinctive branch rings at regular intervals. They were so large that they could support whole ecosystems. In the Ironwood Glades, each tree housed 750 Freeglade Lancers.

Features

A species of mushrooms from which sky nectar could be made may grow on the tree as seen in Clash of the Sky Galleons.

Trivia

• On page 288 of The Last of the Sky Pirates, it says that "the ironwoods' leaves were beginning to turn colour and fall". This is most likely an inconsistency, as ironwood pines were described as evergreen trees, whose leaves do not change colour or fall off in autumn.