2015 $20 Forests of Canada - Columbian Yew Tree Fine Silver (No Tax)

The Columbia forest is found in a series of mountain ranges located roughly 600 kilometres from the Pacific coast in southeastern British Columbia. It is the world’s only inland temperate rainforest, and the only temperate rainforest where the majority of its moisture falls as snow instead of rain.

As the forest grows from the valley floors up to high mountain altitudes, it creates a variety of increasingly difficult growing conditions, and the western yew (Taxus brevifolia) is one of the few tree species that has mastered all of them. This highly-adaptive, slow-growing and long-lived tree is also one of the few coniferae species that does not have cones. Instead, the western yew produces individual seeds that are protected by fleshy, berry-like casings that look like red rubies sitting atop its slender twigs