An evergreen tree 60 to 80 ft (occasionally 100 ft) high in the wild state, with a trunk 6 to 16 ft in girth and silvery white when young; young shoots clothed with yellowish-brown down. Leaves roundish ovate to diamond-shaped, broadly wedge-shaped at the base, rounded or pointed at the apex, doubly round-toothed, 1⁄3 to 5⁄8 in. long, 1⁄4 to 1⁄2 in. wide, glabrous on both surfaces except for one or two pits in the blade near the base beneath, which are lined with brown hairs; stalk 1⁄16 in. long, downy. Male flowers solitary. Husks 1⁄4 to 3⁄8 in. long, with four or five rows of gland-tipped appendages on each valve. Nutlets three, their wings prolonged at the apex and ending in gland-tipped points.
Native of New Zealand on both islands, up to 3,500 ft above sea-level. It is allied to N. cunninghamii, but that species has singly (not doubly) toothed leaves, and the curious hairy pits seen in N. menziesii are absent. Also in N. cunninghamii the wings of the nutlets are not prolonged at the apex.
Although not a success at Kew, N. menziesii is hardy enough in mid-Sussex in a sheltered position, as is shown by the tree at Nymans, which was planted before 1917 and measures 57 × 61⁄4 ft (1970). Others are: Caerhays, Cornwall, 62 × 83⁄4 ft at 1 ft, dividing into five stems at 3 ft (1971) and another of 64 × 63⁄4 ft (1971); Trewithen, Cornwall, 54 × 33⁄4 ft (1971); Galloway House, Wigtons., a bush 40 ft high (1967); Castlewellan, Co. Down, N. Ireland, 30 × 23⁄4 ft (1966); Mount Usher, Co. Wicklow, Eire, 39 × 31⁄4 ft at 3 ft (1966).
Although some specimens of N. menziesii in this country have a whitish bark, as is said to be usual in young trees in New Zealand, they more commonly have a bark resembling that of the common gean, dark in colour with horizontal bands of lenticels.