Cabbage trees are among New Zealand's most widespread native exports, but they cop more than their fair share of hate in their home country.

Last month, 24 were found dying along the Christchurch Coastal Pathway in a case of suspected poisoning. The chairman of the pathway group said the premeditated killing "made my heart go cold".

There have been reports of the trees being burned or ripped from public places – victims, it seems, of people who despise them for their habit of dropping leaves so tough they entangle lawnmowers.

IAIN MCGREGOR/STUFF Cabbage trees, or tī kōuka, line the banks of Christchurch's Heathcote River.

Botanist Dr Philip Simpson – author of Dancing Leaves, an award-winning book on tī kōuka (as the trees are known in te reo Māori) – said cabbage trees were beloved by Māori and early European settlers.

READ MORE:

* Make like a tree and leave

* The cabbage tree; a true Kiwi great

* Cabbage tree rules not clear-cut in South Canterbury

Māori used them as food, fibre and medicine, as guide posts and to mark significant sites like urupā. Captain Cook brewed beer with them, and early European settlers used them to build chimneys.

"Cabbage trees are symbolic of a no-nonsense society, they're practical, they're sensible, they're brave, they're creative, they're good-looking and they're useful," Simpson said.

Unlike other notable natives like kauri and rātā, tī kōuka are common in urban environments. The animosity towards them was driven, in part, by the downtrend in fireplaces and the rise of motorised lawnmowers, Simpson said.

The leaves, which were used to make ropes and snares by Māori, caught in lawnmowers and, while they were excellent fire starters, fewer people now had fireplaces.

ALDEN WILLIAMS/STUFF One of the 24 dead and dying cabbage trees found along the Christchurch Coastal Pathway in an instance of suspected poisoning.

Simpson said the trees were valued for their tropical, palm-like aesthetic, and had been exported from New Zealand to temperate zones around the world to adorn gardens.

"There's no other New Zealand plant that is so widespread as the cabbage tree," Simpson said. "They're idiosyncratic in a Dr Seuss sort of way, they're friendly to the human psyche."

Tī kōuka are popular in the south of England, where they are known as Torquay or Torbay palms – the local tourism board even makes use of them as a marketing symbol.

IAIN MCGREGOR/STUFF Māori used tī kōuka for food, fibres and medicine, while early European settlers used it to build chimneys.

Riverton gardening writer Robert Guyton described them as a "splendid, iconic plant that has great depth of significance across Aotearoa". Birds nested in them and ate their berries, and their flowers had a "delightful" fragrance".

But while overseas visitors sung their praises as exotic beauties, Guyton said many New Zealanders disliked tī kōuka because the leaves "don't compost easily and appear to nest in the bearings and spindles of lawnmowers".

This dislike can extend to outright criminality in some cases. Christchurch Coastal Pathway chairman Scott Babington said he was "99.9 per cent" certain the 24 trees found dead last month were poisoned.

The group was waiting for confirmation of their suspicions before laying a complaint with police. Babington said police "aren't going to drop everything and go investigate some dead cabbage trees", but he still felt it was important to report the incident.

He suspected someone who lived near the pathway, which stretched from Ferrymead to Sumner, was responsible for the poisoning and that the truth might come out with the "tincture of time".

Babington estimated it would cost about $3000 to replace the trees, which the group had fundraised for before passing over ownership to the city council. It was a "knife to the heart" to find out they had been targeted.

"It's very premeditated. They didn't just go along and think 'I hate cabbage trees' and pull them out. . . they clearly spent a lot of time and effort doing it."

The response to the attack showed how strongly people felt about tī kōuka, he said. In a show of defiance to the poisoner, the suggestion had been made to plant two for every fallen tree.

"I'd love that," he said.