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June 02, 2005
The Oldest Tree
Today's International Herald Tribune has an article about hiking Japan's rain soaked Yakushima island. It contains the following:
it nurtures an ancient forest of massive cedars that in 1993 earned it designation by Unesco as a World Heritage Site. The giant trees, called yakusugi, spend their lives performing an arboreal tai chi, twisting and stretching in a spurt that lasts centuries. The oldest and largest yakusugi, jomonsugi, has taken more than 6,000 years to grow only 25 meters high and 16 meters around, and its tortured circumference bears witness to millennia of tempests.
I had thought the Methuselah tree is regarded as the world's oldest living organism at about 4600 years.
Posted by dag at June 2, 2005 12:52 PM