The sea spray reaches it. Salt crystals form on the bracket's upper surface. The fungus does not die. It darkens. The upper surface becomes black. Cracked. The margin remains pale brown. Velvety. The bracket is woody. Hard. You cannot cut it with a pocket knife. You can hit it with a hammer. It will not break. The bracket grows for years. Each season adds a new layer. The oldest specimens are fifteen centimetres across. Thick. Heavy. The tree beneath them is dying. The fungus entered through a wound. A branch broken by wind. Bark stripped by a storm. The mycelium spread. The tree compartmentalised. It lost. The bracket fruits. The tree declines. The bracket wins. Diet is parasitic then saprotrophic. Phellinus noxius begins as a pathogen. It infects living pohutukawa through wounds. The mycelium grows through the bark. It enters the cambium. It blocks water transport. The branch above wilts. The leaves yellow. The tree defends. It walls off the infection. Black lines form in the wood. The fungus crosses them. The defence fails. The branch dies. The fungus switches to decay. It consumes the dead wood. White rot spreads. The wood becomes pale. Soft. Honeycombed. The bracket grows larger. The tree weakens. A second pathogen enters. A third. The tree falls. The bracket continues on the log. It fruits for another decade. Then the log crumbles. The fungus moves to the next tree. Habitat is coastal pohutukawa forest and urban pohutukawa specimens. The species is most common in Northland, Auckland, the Coromandel, and the Bay of Plenty. It follows pohutukawa. Where the tree grows, the fungus may appear. Not every tree hosts it. Infection requires a wound. A wound requires stress. Cyclones break branches. Possums strip bark. People prune badly. The fungus enters. It spreads slowly. Decades pass. The tree dies. The bracket remains. Urban pohutukawa are especially vulnerable. Lawnmower damage. Car impacts. Poor planting depth. The fungus finds them. The bracket appears. The council removes the tree. The bracket disappears. Range across New Zealand matches the natural range of pohutukawa. Northland. Auckland. Coromandel. Bay of Plenty. Gisborne. The northern Taranaki coast. South Island populations are limited. Pohutukawa occurs naturally on the west coast of the South Island as far south as Greymouth. The fungus occurs there too. Rarely. The climate is marginal. The bracket needs warmth. It needs the northern summers. In the South Island, it grows slowly. It fruits rarely. Populations are small. They may be declining. Climate change may shift the range. Warmer winters favour the fungus. Colder winters limit it. The South Island is cold. The fungus struggles. Threats are the same as threats to pohutukawa. Myrtle rust (Austropuccinia psidii) arrived in New Zealand in 2017. It infects young pohutukawa growth. Repeated infections weaken trees. Weakened trees are more susceptible to Phellinus noxius. The fungus benefits. The tree does not. Urban development removes coastal pohutukawa. Subdivisions. Road widening. Sea walls. Each removed tree is a lost host. Each lost host is a lost bracket. The species is not rare. It is not common. It persists in fragments. Fragments erode. The bracket erodes with them.