(no subject)
Sep. 7th, 2008 11:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
theweaselkingMeet Pando.
Pando is a tree.
More particularly, Pando is a single Aspen tree organism 43 hectares in size, whose root system weighs 6 thousand tonnes, estimated to be 80,000 years old. At any given time, it has about 47,000 trunks, all of which die and are replaced by the root system regularly - the average age of the trunks is about 130. Nothing that happens on the surface affects the root bundle - a forest fire that wipes out all it's competitors on the surface? It just loses some trunks and sends up new ones through the ash.
The climate of Utah has changed significantly since Pando's birth - to the point where it's estimated that it hasn't flowered successfully since the last ice age.
Pando is a tree.
More particularly, Pando is a single Aspen tree organism 43 hectares in size, whose root system weighs 6 thousand tonnes, estimated to be 80,000 years old. At any given time, it has about 47,000 trunks, all of which die and are replaced by the root system regularly - the average age of the trunks is about 130. Nothing that happens on the surface affects the root bundle - a forest fire that wipes out all it's competitors on the surface? It just loses some trunks and sends up new ones through the ash.
The climate of Utah has changed significantly since Pando's birth - to the point where it's estimated that it hasn't flowered successfully since the last ice age.
(no subject)
Date: 2008-09-07 04:42 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-09-07 05:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2008-09-07 06:12 pm (UTC)This is the sort of plant which could (and has) done it.
I WANT TO SEE!!!
(no subject)
Date: 2008-09-08 05:52 am (UTC)