Abies baishanzu is a unique plant in China, belonging to Abies of Pinaceae. Its branches are straight, covered with scales, shaped like pine trees, and its needles are arranged in strips, which looks like fir trees. Therefore, Abies baishanzu is a "pine-like rather than pine-like, fir-like rather than fir" plant, which is only found in baishanzu, qingyuan county, Zhejiang Province, China and planted by Wu, a senior engineer of qingyuan county Forestry Science and Technology Station. It is a national key protected wild plant.

Abies baishanzu was first known to the world, and it was not until 1976 that China botanists announced the discovery of this new plant species to the world. Since there are only five Abies baishanzu at present, in order to protect, cultivate and breed this endangered Abies baishanzu, baishanzu Nature Reserve was established in 1985. 1987, Abies baishanzu was listed as one of the rarest and endangered tree species in the world. I hope more people will protect this Baishanzu fir tree.

Abies baishanzu was first discovered in 1965. One day, Wu and two workers went up the mountain to collect specimens, and suddenly they found an unusual conifer, so they immediately collected specimens such as branches and leaves, but they didn't collect any fruits. It was not until 10 years later that Wu finally collected its cone specimens. With the support of relevant experts, Wu wrote a paper "Baishanzu Abies-Discovery of a New Abies". Verified and identified by Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, it was first published in the journal of Plant Taxonomy, and was officially named Abies baishanzu. Before that, 48 species of firs found all over the world, including more than a dozen in China, were all named by foreigners. At this point, Wu became the first person in China to name fir.

Why are there so few Abies in Baishanzu? In addition to unfavorable protection, Abies baishanzu rarely blooms and bears fruit. Even though Abies baishanzu was lucky enough to bear fruit, it never germinated and grew seedlings after it matured and fell. It is precisely because of the impossibility of seed reproduction that this kind of tree survives less and less in the world. If four existing trees die, Abies baishanzu will be extinct on the earth. In order to cultivate Abies baishanzu, Wu and his colleagues tried repeatedly, and finally took Abies japonica as the rootstock, and adopted various grafting methods such as branch grafting, butt joint, split grafting and sub-grafting, which achieved success and shocked the plant community at home and abroad. At present, the successful experience of cutting propagation has been obtained. Dr Dudley, Chairman of Plant Breeding Committee of USDA, praised this achievement as "of great significance to the whole world".