An ancient cypress in southern Chile could be more than 5,000 years old, making it the world’s most aged tree, new research finds.
Known as “Great Grandfather,” the endangered alerce tree lies in a ravine in Alerce Costero National Park. Scientists estimated its age using computer models based on data gathered from a sample.
“This method tells us that 80 percent of all possible growth trajectories give us an age of this living tree greater than 5,000 years,” Jonathan Barichivich, an ecologist at the Climate and Environmental Sciences Laboratory in Paris, told Reuters. “There is only a 20 percent chance that the tree is younger.”
The findings suggest that the tree is older than the current record-holder, Methuselah, a 4,853-year-old bristlecone pine in the White Mountains of California. Barichivich, who led the research on Great Grandfather, said the tree could be as much as 5,484 years old.
Read more at Yale Environment 360
Photo Credit: Yiyo Zamorano via Wikimedia Commons
