I have been keeping a plant of this NZ member of the Pandanus family in the greenhouse as a mother plant. It really prefers to perch up on trees where it can send down long roots to the forest floor. The lower image below shows the incredible aerial rooting system of plants growing on large Dacrycarpus in coastal NZ forest. Large tangled lumps along with Collospermum crash down with branches occasionally (the early NZ timber fellers called them widow makers) creating chaos on the floor. The fibres were useful for the Maori people as tying cord and they used other parts of the plant for weaving and the fruit pulp is sweet and edible.

This fellow seems to be more than happy in the ground though where I can break pieces off, get them rooted and then try them outside epiphytically on host plants in the NZ part of the garden. It is always a pleasant bright green to look at it and surprised us by flowering this week for the 1st time. Reading up on the fertilization of the flower it seems that it may have been designed to be pollinated by bats. No rodents lurking in the NZ forest back along.