Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio, Hey brain Stuff Lauren Vogelbaum here. The title of oldest tree in the world is surprisingly enough up for grabs, since about a majestically gnarled bristle cone pine in California has held the designation, only to be usurped by an up and comer discovered on a Swedish mountaintop, and not to
be outdone. A controversial fine in a Chilean forest has tree aficionados wondering whether an ancient Cyprus could actually be hundreds, yes, hundreds of years older than any known living tree in existence. With the competition literally growing, Crowning the world's oldest tree is much more complicated than one might think. Let's look
at the contenders. Before the Egyptians had even started constructing the famed Pyramids of Giza, there was a tiny tree putting down roots in the White Mountains of eastern California. This tree, bristle cone pine, dubbed Methuselah, is still growing in California's Great Basin and was once believed to be the world's oldest tree. Tree ring data from a core sample of its trunk estimates its age at four thousand,
eight hundred and fifty three years old. Another candidate is a Patagonian cyprus that was found in Chile in two known fondly as grand a Boilo, meaning great grandfather, This particular tree, found growing in a ravine in Chile's Allers Costeo National Park, is estimated at five thousand, four hundred and eighty four years old, which is more than six
hundred years older than Methuselah. However, because researchers estimated the tree's age based on a partial sample of the core, there is some controversy surrounding the accuracy of the estimate. But on a mountaintop in Sweden, a spruce tree has kept its tenacious hold on life for nearly ten thousand year. The spruce, which took root at the end of the world's last ice age in about seven thousand, five hundred and fifty two b c e, was discovered by scientists
surveying mountain tree species back in two thousand four. Its age was confirmed by carbon dating in two thousand eight. It was a surprise to researchers because science had previously thought that this particular type of spruce had been introduced to the area much more recently than that. The find has researchers revising their timelines of when animals and people immigrating across the land mass close to shrinking glaciers may
have introduced the spruces and other trees too. Fossilized acorns found in the area may have been brought by humans as they traveled. The discovery of the Mountain spruce is not without controversy. However, The trees remarkable age is attributed to its roots system, which has been alive for at least four generations. The visible part of the tree, the trunk, branches, cones, and needles, only lives for about six hundred years, so when the trunk dies, a cloned stem takes root to
replace it. The ability to replace a new trunk from the tree's root system has been key to which lengthy survival. But is a long living clone growing from a generation spanning root system still the same tree. It's a question that scientists and record book publishers are still debating. One thing, though, is certain. If you consider that all the world's oldest trees have lived anywhere from five thousand to nearly ten thousand years, they're each a living example of nature's ingenuity.
While even the shortest lived trees, like most fruit trees, can survive for fifty years, some species, like pine trees, grow so slowly that even at the age of forty, they may only be six inches or about fifteen centimeters tall. This slow and study wins the race strategy appears to be a winning one at least when trees are young, but changes as trees age. A study published in the journal Nature reports that the older tree is the faster
it will grow. Previously prevailing thought was that tree growth slowed with age, but now researchers know that the largest and oldest trees can increase their wood, bark, and leaf mass by hundred pounds about six every year. And unlike most living creatures, whose cells change and break down each day that passes, many trees don't have an age limit. While trees can come to being cut down or to fire, insect infestations, diseases, or natural occurrences like lightning, some trees
could technically live indefinitely and whatever their age. The world's oldest trees are vital not only to the health of their respective environments, but as a measure of climate change. By studying the tree's core samples, Scientists are able to see the impact of environmental changes on trees and their surrounding, and the study of tree rings is called dendro chronology.
Using the width of a tree ring, which signifies a tree's growth in a single year, scientists can verify whether it was a year of drought resulting in a narrow ring, or of excess moisture resulting in a wide ring. Identifying similar bands across a range of trees helps scientists connect data projections to a timeline and helps identify which trees
survive a changing climate. Today's episode is based on the article what is the oldest tree in the World on how stuff works dot com written by Laurie L. Dove. Brain Stuff is production by Heart Radio and partnership with how stuff works dot com, and it's produced by Tyler Klang. For more podcasts from My heart Radio, visit the heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.