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| Celebrate Earth Day With a 4,800-Year-Old Tree (If You Can Find It) | Celebrate Earth Day With a 4,800-Year-Old Tree (If You Can Find It) |
| (about 1 hour later) | |
| This Earth Day, we celebrate the world’s oldest known tree, a Great Basin bristlecone pine, which turns 4,847 or so this year. | This Earth Day, we celebrate the world’s oldest known tree, a Great Basin bristlecone pine, which turns 4,847 or so this year. |
| But you can’t see it — well, you can, but you wouldn’t know for sure which tree it is. | But you can’t see it — well, you can, but you wouldn’t know for sure which tree it is. |
| The United States Forest Service keeps the tree’s exact location secret to protect it from would-be vandals, researchers and loggers. | The United States Forest Service keeps the tree’s exact location secret to protect it from would-be vandals, researchers and loggers. |
| The tree, known as Methuselah, is said to sit atop a wind-battered mountain in the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest, a part of Inyo National Forest in east-central California. | The tree, known as Methuselah, is said to sit atop a wind-battered mountain in the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest, a part of Inyo National Forest in east-central California. |
| Methuselah’s age was discovered by Edmund Schulman, a scientist with the University of Arizona’s Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, in 1957. Dr. Schulman estimated its age by taking core samples from the tree and counting its rings. Dendrochronologists — people who study the ages of trees — have examined at least tens of thousands of trees around the world since then, but none have been quite as senior as Methuselah. | Methuselah’s age was discovered by Edmund Schulman, a scientist with the University of Arizona’s Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, in 1957. Dr. Schulman estimated its age by taking core samples from the tree and counting its rings. Dendrochronologists — people who study the ages of trees — have examined at least tens of thousands of trees around the world since then, but none have been quite as senior as Methuselah. |
| The forest service is so protective of Methuselah’s identity that it does not release pictures of the tree, lest a woodsy sleuth track down the tree based on its appearance. (Debra Schweizer, a spokeswoman for Inyo National Forest, suggested that it might be irresponsible for a news organization to publish a picture of Methuselah.) | The forest service is so protective of Methuselah’s identity that it does not release pictures of the tree, lest a woodsy sleuth track down the tree based on its appearance. (Debra Schweizer, a spokeswoman for Inyo National Forest, suggested that it might be irresponsible for a news organization to publish a picture of Methuselah.) |
| The former oldest tree, Prometheus, was cut down in 1964 in Great Basin National Park in Nevada by a graduate student researching the effects of climate change on receding glaciers, whose size could be measured by their influence on the rings of the ancient pine trees. | The former oldest tree, Prometheus, was cut down in 1964 in Great Basin National Park in Nevada by a graduate student researching the effects of climate change on receding glaciers, whose size could be measured by their influence on the rings of the ancient pine trees. |
| There are a few accounts of what happened: The student, Donald R. Currey, said in a PBS documentary that the normal approach to coring a tree was not working and that he wasn’t experienced enough to know what to do, so he cut it down with the help of some foresters. Members of the forest service said he got his drill bit stuck in the tree, and so he and the foresters cut it down to remove his tool. | There are a few accounts of what happened: The student, Donald R. Currey, said in a PBS documentary that the normal approach to coring a tree was not working and that he wasn’t experienced enough to know what to do, so he cut it down with the help of some foresters. Members of the forest service said he got his drill bit stuck in the tree, and so he and the foresters cut it down to remove his tool. |
| There is no way to know a tree’s age just by looking at it, said Matthew Salzer, a research associate at the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research. But it does usually have certain markers that can tip off researchers to its old age: smooth bark, thick branches or a spiked top where the tree has died in places. | There is no way to know a tree’s age just by looking at it, said Matthew Salzer, a research associate at the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research. But it does usually have certain markers that can tip off researchers to its old age: smooth bark, thick branches or a spiked top where the tree has died in places. |
| To pin down the date (or era) of Methuselah’s birth, Dr. Schulman took several samples from the tree using a tool called an inclement borer and matched up the ring patterns from each sample “to travel back in time,” Dr. Salzer said. Because bristlecone pines do not have cylindrical trunks — they are twisted by the wind into natural sculptures — taking samples from different parts of the tree can give an estimate of the tree’s age, Dr. Salzer said. | |
| Bristlecone pines often live for thousands of years in extreme conditions, and their growth rings can give scientists a lot of information about environmental conditions in the time before satellites, pens, paper or the Roman alphabet. | Bristlecone pines often live for thousands of years in extreme conditions, and their growth rings can give scientists a lot of information about environmental conditions in the time before satellites, pens, paper or the Roman alphabet. |
| Like many old things, bristlecone pines are also very slow-moving: Their trunks start dying around their 1,000th birthday, and their living tissue — their crowns and vascular tissues — grow about one-hundredth of an inch in a good year, which makes it difficult to accurately determine their age, said Ms. Schweizer. | Like many old things, bristlecone pines are also very slow-moving: Their trunks start dying around their 1,000th birthday, and their living tissue — their crowns and vascular tissues — grow about one-hundredth of an inch in a good year, which makes it difficult to accurately determine their age, said Ms. Schweizer. |
| While Methuselah is a special tree, it might not be the oldest one in the forest, Ms. Schweizer said, adding, “if you are so focused on seeing that tree, you are literally missing the forest for the tree.” | While Methuselah is a special tree, it might not be the oldest one in the forest, Ms. Schweizer said, adding, “if you are so focused on seeing that tree, you are literally missing the forest for the tree.” |
| Some organizations suggest that there is a tree in the same forest that is older than Methuselah — they estimate that it is 5,065 years old — but the existence of this tree, and its age, could not be confirmed by the forest service, the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research or the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive. | Some organizations suggest that there is a tree in the same forest that is older than Methuselah — they estimate that it is 5,065 years old — but the existence of this tree, and its age, could not be confirmed by the forest service, the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research or the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive. |
| “There is likely a tree older than Methuselah in the grove, but researchers are still confirming its exact age,” Ms. Schweizer said. | “There is likely a tree older than Methuselah in the grove, but researchers are still confirming its exact age,” Ms. Schweizer said. |
| To put things in perspective, Methuselah, named for the biblical figure who lived to be 969 years old, had long since spread its roots in the soil when the Egyptians began building the pyramids, and democracy would not begin for another 2,212 years. | To put things in perspective, Methuselah, named for the biblical figure who lived to be 969 years old, had long since spread its roots in the soil when the Egyptians began building the pyramids, and democracy would not begin for another 2,212 years. |