‘Not that many people would want these things in their yard. Nobody in their right mind would want to sit under one.’--David Lofgren,botanist : Attack of the Killer Pine Cones

Pine cones the size of bowling balls have been dropping like bombs from a bunya-bunya tree at a downtown Victorian mansion here.

The 60-foot tree, native to Australia, has dropped about 150 of the 10-pound cones in the last few weeks. So far no one has been hit, but there have been a few near misses, said members of an engineering firm housed in the mansion.

“Once I saw five fall at once--boo-boo-boo-boo-boom!” said Ray Chmielewski, 42, a draftsman at Johnson & Nielsen Associates. “One of them hit you on the head and it’d knock you silly.

“One fell about three feet behind my 14-year-old son, who is a gardener here,” Chmielewski said. “It frightened the lad, to say the least.”

In 1981, when the tree last dumped a large load of cones, Chmielewski said, people called it the “Invasion of the Killer Pine Cones” and inquiries came in from botanists around the world.

This year, the 85-year-old mansion has taken a beating and the yard is a mini-disaster area. One of the cones smashed and splintered a section of wooden hand railing. Another twisted a metal rain gutter. The sidewalk is covered with splotches where cones have fallen with a resounding thud from a height of up to 60 feet, Chmielewski said.

Now, the prospect of taking home a souvenir or two has attracted hundreds of local residents who stand and stare just out of range.

“Any cones fall today?” asked Betty Ford, 33. “I want to put one in my garden. Maybe I can grow one of these trees--a little one.”

But one man looked up at the tree and mused, “I’m thinking of a lawn party--for my in-laws.”

Terry Nielsen, supervisor of the city’s Park Department, said the tree is one of about six in Riverside, including three in nearby White Park. The trees seem to thrive in Riverside’s warm, dry climate.

“We don’t recommend you picnic under those trees,” he said, adding that each has been posted with a sign that reads: “Caution. Cones May Fall at Any Time.”

Nielsen said it has been years since any of the area’s bunya-bunya trees have unleashed so large a crop of the giant cones.

“You get a decent fall every three to five years,” he said. “About three years ago, when I worked in Corona, one hit a gentleman on the shoulder and put a good bruise on him. He didn’t sue us, thank goodness.”

A few cones still dangle from the highest branches of the bunya-bunya trees in White Park, but city workers have knocked most of them down because of the hazard they pose.

At Johnson & Nielsen Associates, a hand-painted sign warns visitors to use a side entrance well out of harm’s way.

Chmielewski said there is usually some warning before a cone comes down. “You can hear them crashing down through the branches,” said Chmielewski, who has collected hundreds of them in recent weeks.

“They have white seeds in them as big as walnuts that taste like wood or sawdust,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “If you’re a termite, you’d love them.”

Nonetheless, the bunya-bunya seeds are considered a delicacy in Australia and Singapore, where they are roasted or boiled.

Most Are Old

Andrew C. Sanders, herbarium curator for the department of botany and plant sciences at the University of California, Riverside, said most of the city’s bunya-bunya trees are 80 to 100 years old and were planted next to Victorian houses built around the turn of the century.

“This particular species ( Araucaria bidwillii ) is native to the tropical regions of northern Australia,” Sanders said.

There are also a few other bunya-bunya trees scattered throughout Southern California.

“Not that many people would want these things in their yard,” said David Lofgren, consulting botanist at the Los Angeles County Arboretum in Arcadia, which has at least two of the trees. “Nobody in their right mind would want to sit under one.”