As far as I am aware there are two types of growth patterns for trees i.e. fast growing and slow growing.

My understanding of fast growing trees is that their cycle is short compared to the slower growth trees. One example , I can think of is a wattle variety of tree that has a rapid growth period that lasts approx 7 – 12 years from memory and then the tree will die back and in some cases literally fall down.

My question is this…. do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense? There are some trees that are now living that have reached thousands of years of age as a single organism.

The Wollemi pine is considered one large living organism (I believe) because all of the plants have the same genome.

I was reading about a Boboa Tree in Africa the other day and the trees have to separate growth patterns as they age one is the bulbous growth and then there is the secondary growth period where the middle of the plant hollows out but the outer wall of the tree continues to draw up water and nutrient. There is one example of this tree species that has been growing for approx 1700 years or probably longer than that.

Do they yet know if a slow growing tree die at some point or grow indefinitely? Is there enough evidence to know this answer as yet?

monkey skipper said:

As far as I am aware there are two types of growth patterns for trees i.e. fast growing and slow growing.

My understanding of fast growing trees is that their cycle is short compared to the slower growth trees. One example , I can think of is a wattle variety of tree that has a rapid growth period that lasts approx 7 – 12 years from memory and then the tree will die back and in some cases literally fall down.

My question is this…. do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense? There are some trees that are now living that have reached thousands of years of age as a single organism.

The Wollemi pine is considered one large living organism (I believe) because all of the plants have the same genome.

I was reading about a Boboa Tree in Africa the other day and the trees have to separate growth patterns as they age one is the bulbous growth and then there is the secondary growth period where the middle of the plant hollows out but the outer wall of the tree continues to draw up water and nutrient. There is one example of this tree species that has been growing for approx 1700 years or probably longer than that.

Do they yet know if a slow growing tree die at some point or grow indefinitely? Is there enough evidence to know this answer as yet?

I’m not an expert on this. By “fast growing” and “slow growing” do you mean “softwood” and “hardwood”? I ask because although the fastest growth occurs in softwoods, the slowest growth can also occur in softwoods.

Damn it. There are too many variations.

Start with the bristlecone pine. This is famous for its provable longevity. The Methuselah tree was 4,789 years old when sampled (likely in 1957), and an even older live bristlecone pine has been found since. The bristlecone pine lives in the snow for most of the year so grows exceedingly slowly. Parts of the tree die off as it grows, which means that one side will die and the other side remains growing, more dying off slowly at time progresses so it becomes a sensitive balance as to whether the rate of growth exceeds the rate at which it dies. Eventually the rate of dying will exceed the rate of growth.

There are plants that are much older than this, but the bristlecone pine is the oldest that can be dated by tree rings. That’s important not just because of the age but because it provides a continuous climate record at that location over a long period of time.

Another plant where the rate of dying slowly exceeds the rate of growth that I’ve heard about is the olive. The oldest known olive trees still alive live on the island of Crete. “Although its exact age cannot be verified, the Olive Tree of Vouves might be the oldest among them, estimated at over 3,000 years old. It still produces olives, and they are highly prized.” It’s possible to take cuttings from very old olive trees, such cuttings are genetically identical to the original so can be considered to be the same tree as the original. Such cuttings have a new zest for life.

Other old plants are clonal colony plants, where the central core died out long ago as the growth progressed outwards. There’s a 11,700-year-old Creosote bush clonal colony, named “King Clone”, in the Mojave Desert near the Lucerne Valley in California.

There’s a 80,000-year-old Quaking Aspen clonal colony named “Pando” in the Fish Lake National Forest in south-central Utah.

> do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense?

I suspect that the only organisms with a true capped life expectancy are those that stop growing at some point in their lives. Mammals do. Some fish don’t, their rate of growth decreases with age but they never stop growing completely. Some clams don’t. I also suspect that some trees don’t.

mollwollfumble said:

monkey skipper said:

As far as I am aware there are two types of growth patterns for trees i.e. fast growing and slow growing.

My understanding of fast growing trees is that their cycle is short compared to the slower growth trees. One example , I can think of is a wattle variety of tree that has a rapid growth period that lasts approx 7 – 12 years from memory and then the tree will die back and in some cases literally fall down.

My question is this…. do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense? There are some trees that are now living that have reached thousands of years of age as a single organism.

The Wollemi pine is considered one large living organism (I believe) because all of the plants have the same genome.

I was reading about a Boboa Tree in Africa the other day and the trees have to separate growth patterns as they age one is the bulbous growth and then there is the secondary growth period where the middle of the plant hollows out but the outer wall of the tree continues to draw up water and nutrient. There is one example of this tree species that has been growing for approx 1700 years or probably longer than that.

Do they yet know if a slow growing tree die at some point or grow indefinitely? Is there enough evidence to know this answer as yet?

I’m not an expert on this. By “fast growing” and “slow growing” do you mean “softwood” and “hardwood”? I ask because although the fastest growth occurs in softwoods, the slowest growth can also occur in softwoods.

Damn it. There are too many variations.

Start with the bristlecone pine. This is famous for its provable longevity. The Methuselah tree was 4,789 years old when sampled (likely in 1957), and an even older live bristlecone pine has been found since. The bristlecone pine lives in the snow for most of the year so grows exceedingly slowly. Parts of the tree die off as it grows, which means that one side will die and the other side remains growing, more dying off slowly at time progresses so it becomes a sensitive balance as to whether the rate of growth exceeds the rate at which it dies. Eventually the rate of dying will exceed the rate of growth.

!https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/Methuselah_Walk_USA_Ca.jpg

There are plants that are much older than this, but the bristlecone pine is the oldest that can be dated by tree rings. That’s important not just because of the age but because it provides a continuous climate record at that location over a long period of time.

Another plant where the rate of dying slowly exceeds the rate of growth that I’ve heard about is the olive. The oldest known olive trees still alive live on the island of Crete. “Although its exact age cannot be verified, the Olive Tree of Vouves might be the oldest among them, estimated at over 3,000 years old. It still produces olives, and they are highly prized.” It’s possible to take cuttings from very old olive trees, such cuttings are genetically identical to the original so can be considered to be the same tree as the original. Such cuttings have a new zest for life.

!https://media.mnn.com/assets/images/2010/03/olive-tree-of-vouves.jpg.638×0_q80_crop-smart.jpg

Other old plants are clonal colony plants, where the central core died out long ago as the growth progressed outwards. There’s a 11,700-year-old Creosote bush clonal colony, named “King Clone”, in the Mojave Desert near the Lucerne Valley in California.
!https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/36/King_Clone.jpg/800px-King_Clone.jpg

There’s a 80,000-year-old Quaking Aspen clonal colony named “Pando” in the Fish Lake National Forest in south-central Utah.

> do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense?

I suspect that the only organisms with a true capped life expectancy are those that stop growing at some point in their lives. Mammals do. Some fish don’t, their rate of growth decreases with age but they never stop growing completely. Some clams don’t. I also suspect that some trees don’t.

I think crocodiles don’t stop either.

The worry if a tree lived too long and got too big would be it gets infested with sentient teddy bears that live in it.

Cymek said:

The worry if a tree lived too long and got too big would be it gets infested with sentient teddy bears that live in it.

More likely Drop bears Nimbadon).

One particular Huon Pine occurrence which recently received international attention is the small (1ha) forest patch high on the slopes of Mt Read, near Rosebery. Here, in the wettest part of Tasmania, at an altitude of 1000m (the highest known for Huon Pine), beside the small glacial Lake Johnston, are several hundred trees which share an extraordinary legacy. All are male and all are genetically identical, forming a clone. No variation in DNA could be found between the trees. Even more astounding was the discovery that Huon Pine pollen was present in the bottom sediments of Lake Johnston, carbon-dated at 10,500 years. There are no other Huon Pines within 20 km of Mt Read, and no female trees anywhere in the area.

Frond of Mt Read Huon Pine from potted specimen grown from
a cutting Photo: J & R Coghlan
It is concluded that a male tree became established at Lake Johnston at least 10,500 years ago, and has been propagating itself vegetatively ever since, so that the identical genes survive to this day. How it got there originally is an open question, but as carriage by birds or by wind-blow are unlikely, it most probably arrived during the last Interglacial (about 30,000 years ago) and somehow survived through the Last Glacial period. The main method of growth has probably been by layering – a branch or trunk is weighed down by snow, or partly broken by wind, and roots develop where it is in contact with soil. A new stem grows above the new roots, and so the forest slowly expands. A similar method is commonly seen with the endemic pencil pines, where a copse of multiple trunks is often seen to be interconnected via fallen trunks or branches.

Thus, while the oldest individual tree or stem on the site now may be one to two thousand years old, the organism itself has been living there continuously for at least 10,000 years – a ‘Methuselah tree’ indeed.
Another special aspect of the Mt Read Huon Pine forest is the extraordinary array of other rare and ancient plants in the area. Most of Tasmania’s other endemic conifers are also present, including king billy pine (Athrotaxis selaginoides) and pencil pine (A. cupressoides), and their hybrid A. laxifolia, the cheshunt pine (Diselma archeri), creeping pine (Microcachrys tetragona), and celery-top pine (Phyllocladus asplenifolius). Individuals of four of these species have been found which are over a thousand years old – truly an ancient forest. Of particular interest is the presence of numerous trees of Diselma archeri, a species normally found only as shrubs. One of these trees, looking very ancient and gnarled, is over 10 m high, with a trunk about 60 cm diameter (pictured). Also present is the rare endemic Orites milliganii (Proteaceae), and an abundance of the endemic deciduous beech (Nothofagus gunnii), Tasmania’s only native deciduous tree.
Diselma archeri

Orites milliganii and Nothofagus gunnii at Mt Read

(Left.) Ancient Diselma archeri tree at Lake Johnston. King billy pine and deciduous beech also present.

Photos: K.Corbett
International experts have made detailed studies of the growth rings of the Mt Read Huon Pines, both living and dead, and have pieced together a tree ring chronology of over 4000 years. Because the rings vary with the climate at the time, and particularly with temperature, they give a good indication of how the climate has varied over that time. Of interest in this record is the clear indication of climate warming since the 1960’s.

So an ancient remnant of the Gondwanan forests has survived as a lonely but determined male at Mt Read, and is able to bring us vital information on the changes it has weathered over thousands of years, and a sense of wonder at the strength and durability of this remarkable species.

https://www.apstas.com/Mt__Read_Huon_pine.html

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

sarahs mum said:

One particular Huon Pine occurrence which recently received international attention is the small (1ha) forest patch high on the slopes of Mt Read, near Rosebery. Here, in the wettest part of Tasmania, at an altitude of 1000m (the highest known for Huon Pine), beside the small glacial Lake Johnston, are several hundred trees which share an extraordinary legacy. All are male and all are genetically identical, forming a clone. No variation in DNA could be found between the trees. Even more astounding was the discovery that Huon Pine pollen was present in the bottom sediments of Lake Johnston, carbon-dated at 10,500 years. There are no other Huon Pines within 20 km of Mt Read, and no female trees anywhere in the area.

Frond of Mt Read Huon Pine from potted specimen grown from
a cutting Photo: J & R Coghlan
It is concluded that a male tree became established at Lake Johnston at least 10,500 years ago, and has been propagating itself vegetatively ever since, so that the identical genes survive to this day. How it got there originally is an open question, but as carriage by birds or by wind-blow are unlikely, it most probably arrived during the last Interglacial (about 30,000 years ago) and somehow survived through the Last Glacial period. The main method of growth has probably been by layering – a branch or trunk is weighed down by snow, or partly broken by wind, and roots develop where it is in contact with soil. A new stem grows above the new roots, and so the forest slowly expands. A similar method is commonly seen with the endemic pencil pines, where a copse of multiple trunks is often seen to be interconnected via fallen trunks or branches.

Thus, while the oldest individual tree or stem on the site now may be one to two thousand years old, the organism itself has been living there continuously for at least 10,000 years – a ‘Methuselah tree’ indeed.
Another special aspect of the Mt Read Huon Pine forest is the extraordinary array of other rare and ancient plants in the area. Most of Tasmania’s other endemic conifers are also present, including king billy pine (Athrotaxis selaginoides) and pencil pine (A. cupressoides), and their hybrid A. laxifolia, the cheshunt pine (Diselma archeri), creeping pine (Microcachrys tetragona), and celery-top pine (Phyllocladus asplenifolius). Individuals of four of these species have been found which are over a thousand years old – truly an ancient forest. Of particular interest is the presence of numerous trees of Diselma archeri, a species normally found only as shrubs. One of these trees, looking very ancient and gnarled, is over 10 m high, with a trunk about 60 cm diameter (pictured). Also present is the rare endemic Orites milliganii (Proteaceae), and an abundance of the endemic deciduous beech (Nothofagus gunnii), Tasmania’s only native deciduous tree.
Diselma archeri

Orites milliganii and Nothofagus gunnii at Mt Read

(Left.) Ancient Diselma archeri tree at Lake Johnston. King billy pine and deciduous beech also present.

Photos: K.Corbett
International experts have made detailed studies of the growth rings of the Mt Read Huon Pines, both living and dead, and have pieced together a tree ring chronology of over 4000 years. Because the rings vary with the climate at the time, and particularly with temperature, they give a good indication of how the climate has varied over that time. Of interest in this record is the clear indication of climate warming since the 1960’s.

So an ancient remnant of the Gondwanan forests has survived as a lonely but determined male at Mt Read, and is able to bring us vital information on the changes it has weathered over thousands of years, and a sense of wonder at the strength and durability of this remarkable species.

https://www.apstas.com/Mt__Read_Huon_pine.html

I do remember a documentary mentioning how Australia (or part of the land mass that became formally Australia) kept a lot more old world trees from prior to the last Ice Age because of where the land mass of Australia was at that time ….apparently the slightly warmer conditions meant those old world trees were capable of surviving the changing environment more so than the Northern hemisphere tree species and I suppose isolation of Tassie meant another step in preservation and diversification too.

monkey skipper said:

sarahs mum said:

One particular Huon Pine occurrence which recently received international attention is the small (1ha) forest patch high on the slopes of Mt Read, near Rosebery. Here, in the wettest part of Tasmania, at an altitude of 1000m (the highest known for Huon Pine), beside the small glacial Lake Johnston, are several hundred trees which share an extraordinary legacy. All are male and all are genetically identical, forming a clone. No variation in DNA could be found between the trees. Even more astounding was the discovery that Huon Pine pollen was present in the bottom sediments of Lake Johnston, carbon-dated at 10,500 years. There are no other Huon Pines within 20 km of Mt Read, and no female trees anywhere in the area.

Frond of Mt Read Huon Pine from potted specimen grown from
a cutting Photo: J & R Coghlan
It is concluded that a male tree became established at Lake Johnston at least 10,500 years ago, and has been propagating itself vegetatively ever since, so that the identical genes survive to this day. How it got there originally is an open question, but as carriage by birds or by wind-blow are unlikely, it most probably arrived during the last Interglacial (about 30,000 years ago) and somehow survived through the Last Glacial period. The main method of growth has probably been by layering – a branch or trunk is weighed down by snow, or partly broken by wind, and roots develop where it is in contact with soil. A new stem grows above the new roots, and so the forest slowly expands. A similar method is commonly seen with the endemic pencil pines, where a copse of multiple trunks is often seen to be interconnected via fallen trunks or branches.

Thus, while the oldest individual tree or stem on the site now may be one to two thousand years old, the organism itself has been living there continuously for at least 10,000 years – a ‘Methuselah tree’ indeed.
Another special aspect of the Mt Read Huon Pine forest is the extraordinary array of other rare and ancient plants in the area. Most of Tasmania’s other endemic conifers are also present, including king billy pine (Athrotaxis selaginoides) and pencil pine (A. cupressoides), and their hybrid A. laxifolia, the cheshunt pine (Diselma archeri), creeping pine (Microcachrys tetragona), and celery-top pine (Phyllocladus asplenifolius). Individuals of four of these species have been found which are over a thousand years old – truly an ancient forest. Of particular interest is the presence of numerous trees of Diselma archeri, a species normally found only as shrubs. One of these trees, looking very ancient and gnarled, is over 10 m high, with a trunk about 60 cm diameter (pictured). Also present is the rare endemic Orites milliganii (Proteaceae), and an abundance of the endemic deciduous beech (Nothofagus gunnii), Tasmania’s only native deciduous tree.
Diselma archeri

Orites milliganii and Nothofagus gunnii at Mt Read

(Left.) Ancient Diselma archeri tree at Lake Johnston. King billy pine and deciduous beech also present.

Photos: K.Corbett
International experts have made detailed studies of the growth rings of the Mt Read Huon Pines, both living and dead, and have pieced together a tree ring chronology of over 4000 years. Because the rings vary with the climate at the time, and particularly with temperature, they give a good indication of how the climate has varied over that time. Of interest in this record is the clear indication of climate warming since the 1960’s.

So an ancient remnant of the Gondwanan forests has survived as a lonely but determined male at Mt Read, and is able to bring us vital information on the changes it has weathered over thousands of years, and a sense of wonder at the strength and durability of this remarkable species.

https://www.apstas.com/Mt__Read_Huon_pine.html

I do remember a documentary mentioning how Australia (or part of the land mass that became formally Australia) kept a lot more old world trees from prior to the last Ice Age because of where the land mass of Australia was at that time ….apparently the slightly warmer conditions meant those old world trees were capable of surviving the changing environment more so than the Northern hemisphere tree species and I suppose isolation of Tassie meant another step in preservation and diversification too.

Mt Read was burnt out in last summer’s fires. It would be interesting to know the extent of the Huon pine and Pencil pine damage..

sarahs mum said:

monkey skipper said:

sarahs mum said:

One particular Huon Pine occurrence which recently received international attention is the small (1ha) forest patch high on the slopes of Mt Read, near Rosebery. Here, in the wettest part of Tasmania, at an altitude of 1000m (the highest known for Huon Pine), beside the small glacial Lake Johnston, are several hundred trees which share an extraordinary legacy. All are male and all are genetically identical, forming a clone. No variation in DNA could be found between the trees. Even more astounding was the discovery that Huon Pine pollen was present in the bottom sediments of Lake Johnston, carbon-dated at 10,500 years. There are no other Huon Pines within 20 km of Mt Read, and no female trees anywhere in the area.

Frond of Mt Read Huon Pine from potted specimen grown from
a cutting Photo: J & R Coghlan
It is concluded that a male tree became established at Lake Johnston at least 10,500 years ago, and has been propagating itself vegetatively ever since, so that the identical genes survive to this day. How it got there originally is an open question, but as carriage by birds or by wind-blow are unlikely, it most probably arrived during the last Interglacial (about 30,000 years ago) and somehow survived through the Last Glacial period. The main method of growth has probably been by layering – a branch or trunk is weighed down by snow, or partly broken by wind, and roots develop where it is in contact with soil. A new stem grows above the new roots, and so the forest slowly expands. A similar method is commonly seen with the endemic pencil pines, where a copse of multiple trunks is often seen to be interconnected via fallen trunks or branches.

Thus, while the oldest individual tree or stem on the site now may be one to two thousand years old, the organism itself has been living there continuously for at least 10,000 years – a ‘Methuselah tree’ indeed.
Another special aspect of the Mt Read Huon Pine forest is the extraordinary array of other rare and ancient plants in the area. Most of Tasmania’s other endemic conifers are also present, including king billy pine (Athrotaxis selaginoides) and pencil pine (A. cupressoides), and their hybrid A. laxifolia, the cheshunt pine (Diselma archeri), creeping pine (Microcachrys tetragona), and celery-top pine (Phyllocladus asplenifolius). Individuals of four of these species have been found which are over a thousand years old – truly an ancient forest. Of particular interest is the presence of numerous trees of Diselma archeri, a species normally found only as shrubs. One of these trees, looking very ancient and gnarled, is over 10 m high, with a trunk about 60 cm diameter (pictured). Also present is the rare endemic Orites milliganii (Proteaceae), and an abundance of the endemic deciduous beech (Nothofagus gunnii), Tasmania’s only native deciduous tree.
Diselma archeri

Orites milliganii and Nothofagus gunnii at Mt Read

(Left.) Ancient Diselma archeri tree at Lake Johnston. King billy pine and deciduous beech also present.

Photos: K.Corbett
International experts have made detailed studies of the growth rings of the Mt Read Huon Pines, both living and dead, and have pieced together a tree ring chronology of over 4000 years. Because the rings vary with the climate at the time, and particularly with temperature, they give a good indication of how the climate has varied over that time. Of interest in this record is the clear indication of climate warming since the 1960’s.

So an ancient remnant of the Gondwanan forests has survived as a lonely but determined male at Mt Read, and is able to bring us vital information on the changes it has weathered over thousands of years, and a sense of wonder at the strength and durability of this remarkable species.

https://www.apstas.com/Mt__Read_Huon_pine.html

I do remember a documentary mentioning how Australia (or part of the land mass that became formally Australia) kept a lot more old world trees from prior to the last Ice Age because of where the land mass of Australia was at that time ….apparently the slightly warmer conditions meant those old world trees were capable of surviving the changing environment more so than the Northern hemisphere tree species and I suppose isolation of Tassie meant another step in preservation and diversification too.

Mt Read was burnt out in last summer’s fires. It would be interesting to know the extent of the Huon pine and Pencil pine damage..

You could posit that climate change will not be friendly to some of the upland/montaine environments inlcuding these old bastards..

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

AwesomeO said:

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

pfft…
he did that before lunchtime, must be close to near-infinite by now…

AwesomeO said:

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

I’ve fed a lot to wildlife.

While I have been on the property have lost 3 or 4 acres to forest again. Does that count?

AwesomeO said:

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

Yes but it is nice to see them grow were you live

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150622-can-anything-live-forever

Most animals eventually get old and die. But a few lucky species don’t seem to feel the weight of time, and just keep going and going

“ By Colin Barras

19 June 2015

Immortality can be a curse rather than a blessing – as Tithonus learned to his cost.

This mythical Trojan prince was so handsome that he bewitched Eos, the goddess of dawn. She successfully petitioned Zeus to grant Tithonus immortality so she could be with him forever.

But Zeus interpreted her request literally. Tithonus didn’t die, but he did age. He lost his good looks and his faculties, and Eos lost her interest. She eventually shut him away in a room where he babbles endlessly.

It’s just a story. But as is often the case, truth turns out to be stranger than fiction. Plenty of species really are technically immortal. And unlike Tithonus, many are eternally youthful to boot.”

What we’re talking about here is “biological immortality”, although many biologists would probably rather we didn’t use the phrase.

Biologically immortal organisms do die, but they don’t seem to age

“Immortal really means you don’t die at all, which is stupid,” says Thomas Bosch at the University of Kiel, Germany.

Paradoxical though it might seem, biologically immortal organisms are definitely mortal. They can be killed by a predator, a disease, or a catastrophic change in the environment such as an erupting volcano. But unlike humans, they rarely die simply because they get old.

To put it another way, biologically immortal organisms do die, but they don’t seem to age. They’re basically the exact opposite of Tithonus.

he bristlecone pine is a good example. Some of these North American trees are astonishingly old. They began growing 5000 years ago: about the time the real city of Troy was founded in what is now Turkey.

An old bristlecone pine looks old

As far as external appearances go, the years have been about as kind to the bristlecone pines as they will have been to Tithonus.

“The trees are pretty beaten up,” says Howard Thomas at Aberystwyth University in the UK. “They get struck by lightning, weighed down by heavy snow fall, branches snap off.”

In other words, an old bristlecone pine looks old. But look more closely and it’s a different story.

A study published in 2001 compared pollen and seeds from bristlecone pines of various ages up to 4700 years, and found no significant increase in mutation rates with age. What’s more, the vascular tissue functioned just as well in ancient trees as in juveniles.

The stem cells can apparently remain youthful and vigorous for millennia

Old trees are weather-beaten and gnarled, but at the cellular level they appear to be as youthful as they were when Troy was being built. Their tissues don’t seem to be withered by such vast expanses of time.

No one really knows how the bristlecone pine does it. Their longevity isn’t as well studied as you might expect. But Thomas thinks it probably comes down to a special property of the trees’ “meristems”.

These are bits of the roots and shoots that are home to populations of stem cells, which generate new growth. The stem cells can apparently remain youthful and vigorous for millennia.

“You do get mutations, things can go wrong,” says Thomas. “But like a bacterial culture, the non-mutated cells appear to outperform the damaged ones.”

There’s another possibility, says Lieven De Veylder at Ghent University in Belgium. He thinks a key factor might be a small population of cells in plant meristems called the “quiescent centre”.

These secret tricks of the meristem don’t help most plants achieve immortality

Here, cells divide at a much reduced rate, and that might suppress division of the meristem stem cells too. That could be useful, because every time a cell divides it runs the risk of incorporating a dangerous mutation into its DNA. “Keeping a subpopulation of stem cells that divide only infrequently might be a way to keep a close-to-perfect ‘back-up’ genome,” says De Veylder.

In 2013 his team identified a protein that seems to control activity in the quiescent centre of a plant called Arabidopsis. Similar proteins might help plants like the bristlecone pine avoid cellular ageing, allowing some of them to live for thousands of years.

However, these secret tricks of the meristem don’t help most plants achieve immortality. That’s because they live too fast.

A wave of senescence can overrun the behaviour of the meristem, and you have an annual or biennial plant,” says Thomas. In essence, the cells of plants like Arabidopsis work and divide so quickly, their organs burn out before the meristem can replenish the damaged tissue.

Ming the mollusc is the oldest verified solitary animal on record

By contrast, the biologically immortal plants live at a more measured pace. “Overlaying the meristem activity is a pattern of individual organ longevity,” says Thomas.

When it comes to living fast, plants generally have nothing on animals. That may be why animals rarely manage more than a few centuries before they die. There’s one exception: colonial animals like corals can survive for more than 4000 years. However, the individual coral polyps may be only a few years old.

Ming the mollusc is the oldest verified solitary animal on record. This ocean quahog was 507 years old when biologists dredged it up from the coastal waters around Iceland in 2006, and promptly killed it.

Ming died, but it might have been biologically immortal. In many animal cells, oxygen-containing molecules react with the membranes, generating small molecules that in turn damage other parts of the cell.

Not all animals carry a nice convenient record of their age around with them

But a 2012 study found that ocean quahog cells carry membranes that are unusually resistant to this sort of damage. Ming might have lived so long because its cells, like the cells of bristlecone pine, aged at a negligible rate.

Ming is the oldest animal with an age that can be verified. It’s a mollusc, so biologists can count annual growth lines in its shell, much as botanists can age trees by counting rings in the trunk.

Not all animals carry a nice convenient record of their age around with them. Some of these might be even older than Ming.

ake the Hydra, a tiny soft-bodied animal related to jellyfish. Small animals generally don’t live as long as large ones, but one biologist has kept individual Hydra in the lab for more than four years. That’s an astonishingly long time for an animal that generally measures just 15mm.

Perhaps a few years is about all most manage before succumbing

What’s more, at the end of the four-year experiment the Hydra looked as youthful as on day one. That makes Hydra another case of biological immortality.

Exactly how long individual Hydra might live is anyone’s guess. Perhaps a few years is about all most manage before succumbing to threats like disease. Or perhaps Hydra can live for 10,000 years.

A few years ago Bosch and his colleagues offered an explanation for Hydra’s lack of cellular ageing. Put simply, he says, it again comes down to stem cells.

continued:

Hydra carries a remarkably potent set of stem cells in its tiny body. They are so potent, they can regrow significant chunks of the Hydra’s body in the event of an accident. This ability earned the Hydra its name, inspired by the mythological Hydra of Lerna, which could supposedly re-grow decapitated heads.

If you knock out the FoxO gene, you make Hydra age

The real world Hydra’s regenerative powers are more than a mere party trick: they are crucial during reproduction. Hydra doesn’t usually reproduce sexually, and instead grows tiny clones of itself.

It uses three distinct stem cell populations to replicate all of the various tissues that together form a fully functioning animal. Bosch and his colleagues have found that all three share one protein in common: FoxO. He thinks it’s a key anti-ageing protein.

ctly how FoxO prevents Hydra, and in particular its stem cells, from ageing isn’t yet clear.

Even 100-year-old humans are not biologically immortal

But we do know it acts as a “hub” in the cell that integrates various molecular signals, including some from the cell’s external environment. “We are now working on how these environmental signals are integrated with FoxO,” says Bosch.

FoxO might actually be a universal anti-ageing mechanism throughout the animal kingdom. Humans carry a few versions, and some variants are more common in people who live beyond their 100th birthday.

But even 100-year-old humans are not biologically immortal: at least, not in the way that Hydra is.

Then again, the immortal jellyfish isn’t biologically immortal in quite the way that Hydra is either. But it is immortal.

o understand why, it helps to know a little about the immortal jellyfish’s complicated life cycle.

When jellyfish sperm and egg come together they form a tiny larva. But this larva doesn’t simply grow into an adult jellyfish. Instead it usually plonks down on a hard surface and turns into a soft-bodied branching structure called a polyp.

It’s as if a butterfly suddenly reverted back into a caterpillar

Most of the time these polyps produce tiny clones of themselves – just like Hydra, which is itself a polyp – but in some species the polyp also does something else. It produces small free-swimming male or female jellyfish, which grow into adults and produce jellyfish sperm and eggs. Then the cycle begins again.

Most jellyfish can reverse their development at most stages during this complicated life cycle. But once they grow into a sexually mature adult, they lose the ability to turn back the clock.

The immortal jellyfish disobeys this fundamental rule. Uniquely, even a sexually mature adult can revert to an immature polyp, “thus escaping death and achieving potential immortality”. It’s as if a butterfly suddenly reverted back into a caterpillar.

with most cases of biological immortality, exactly how the immortal jellyfish pulls of this trick is a mystery. It seems to involve a bizarre reversed version of the cellular processes that go on during metamorphosis; the process by which juvenile caterpillars transform into adult butterflies.

Jellyfish don’t have much in common with other animals, which is why their asexual reproductive strategy, and their immortality, seem so peculiar to our eyes.

Even in sexually reproducing animals, biological immortality isn’t entirely unheard of

The two traits may actually be connected, says Bosch. If stem cells do play a vital role in animal biological immortality, then animals that have to carry potent stem cells in order to clone themselves might often be immortal.

On the other side of the coin, a reproductive strategy built around sex is almost invariably a one-way ticket to an early death.

“Maybe you could make the argument that you need lot of energy to make gametes , so that then kills the animal,” says Bosch. That’s certainly the case for male Antechinus, mice-like marsupials that almost literally mate themselves to death.

But even in sexually reproducing animals, biological immortality isn’t entirely unheard of. The American lobster is a good example.

st animals more or less stop growing when they reach sexual maturity, but not American lobsters. What’s more, even as an adult this lobster can regrow a limb if it loses one by accident.

Shorter telomeres mean a shorter lifespan

Both of these features suggest American lobsters retain an impressive ability to regenerate, even into advanced adulthood. That might explain why large specimens are estimated to be at least 140 years old.

The lobsters’ longevity may be connected to the behaviour of their DNA. The long chromosomes in animal cells have special tips on their ends, called telomeres, that help protect the DNA.

But whenever the cell divides and the chromosomes are replicated, the telomeres shorten a little bit, because the replication process can’t quite reach to the very end of the chromosome.

Cymek said:

AwesomeO said:

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

Yes but it is nice to see them grow were you live

Indeed it is, 22 fruit trees here plus two big euyalypts, a pencil pine, cassaranda and a bay tree to add to the existing 5 or so fruit trees, peppercorn tree, African thorn tree and a big eucalyptus that I lopped so it is now a big trunk with a bushy top. Rest of the stuff is wild cherries and stuff to about 5 metres.

Mutations in trees are probably far less life threatening than in animals

continued:

Shorter telomeres mean a shorter lifespan. But American lobsters delay the inevitable using a telomere-lengthening enzyme called telomerase. A 1998 study revealed that this enzyme is found in all of their organs, where it presumably helps keep cells looking youthful for longer.

Telomerase enzymes appear to help tumours grow and spread

In other words, American lobster cells apparently don’t age in a normal way, making the lobsters biologically immortal.

This telomere trick looks like a useful way for any organism to delay ageing. But there’s actually very little evidence that the strategy is used, either by immortal plants or by immortal “lower” animals like the jellyfish. Bosch says it might be unique to “higher” animals.

Certainly, mammals also carry telomerases. In humans, they are active in HeLa cells: the first “immortal” human cells ever identified.

ut in this case, the immortality is bad news. HeLa cells are so named because they were taken – without consent – from Henrietta Lacks, who died of cervical cancer in 1951.

Our “germ line” cells, which give rise to eggs and sperm, are ageless

Telomerase enzymes appear to help tumours grow and spread, which might be why mammals only use them in a few types of cell. HeLa cancer cells might be immortal, but their appearance cost Henrietta Lacks her life.

Cancer cells aren’t the only immortal cells that can be found in the human body. Our “germ line” cells are ageless too. These are the cells that give rise to eggs and sperm, and it’s vital that they can withstand ageing so that babies are born young.

The concept of young babies might sound like a tautology: surely all babies are young? But it’s not, as Dolly the sheep demonstrates.

olly was cloned from sheep mammary gland cells, which aren’t protected from ageing, and so she was born relatively “old”. The telomeres in Dolly’s cells were short even while she was a lamb, and she aged much more quickly than her non-cloned peers. Ultimately she was put down at the relatively tender age of six because of a lung disease.

There is perhaps a crumb of comfort here for anyone frightened of their own death

“The seed of immortality for organisms like us is that, every so often, we have a mechanism that can reset the clock,” says Thomas.

At this point, it should come as no surprise that we don’t know how the clock is reset in our germ cells. Telomerase enzymes are probably a factor, but they’re not the full story. That means we’re a long way from being able to reverse our own ageing, no matter what skin cream adverts might tell you.

Still, there is perhaps a crumb of comfort here for anyone frightened of their own death. We age as individuals, but because of the special properties of our germ cells, our lineage doesn’t age. In that sense, humanity is immortal.

Cymek said:

Mutations in trees are probably far less life threatening than in animals

Trees are probably most vulnerable to abrupt environmental change (this is evident when the boundaries of a rain forest are disrupted by encroachment by land clearing or bush fire causes contribute to major die backs and general regression of rainforest tree territories than say will occur for open wooded tree species.

Pest invasion and human tree felling seem the most obvious to me and landslides caused by flooding (environmental causes) and general land erosion.

Water quality and diversion of water would have impacted trees. Gum trees have changes in behaviors chemically when there are droughts iirc.

monkey skipper said:

Cymek said:

Mutations in trees are probably far less life threatening than in animals

Trees are probably most vulnerable to abrupt environmental change (this is evident when the boundaries of a rain forest are disrupted by encroachment by land clearing or bush fire causes contribute to major die backs and general regression of rainforest tree territories than say will occur for open wooded tree species.

Pest invasion and human tree felling seem the most obvious to me and landslides caused by flooding (environmental causes) and general land erosion.

Water quality and diversion of water would have impacted trees. Gum trees have changes in behaviors chemically when there are droughts iirc.

Overgrazing would be a factor too.

monkey skipper said:

Cymek said:

Mutations in trees are probably far less life threatening than in animals

Trees are probably most vulnerable to abrupt environmental change (this is evident when the boundaries of a rain forest are disrupted by encroachment by land clearing or bush fire causes contribute to major die backs and general regression of rainforest tree territories than say will occur for open wooded tree species.

Pest invasion and human tree felling seem the most obvious to me and landslides caused by flooding (environmental causes) and general land erosion.

Water quality and diversion of water would have impacted trees. Gum trees have changes in behaviors chemically when there are droughts iirc.

Indeed so mostly human created problems.

sarahs mum said:

AwesomeO said:

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

I’ve fed a lot to wildlife.

While I have been on the property have lost 3 or 4 acres to forest again. Does that count?

Sure.

It’s also interesting to see what types of plants or trees you can try and grow in your backyard.
A couple of them are struggling the coffee plant for example and the pineapple doesn’t like it when it rains a lot.
Also going to try a grow peanuts for something different

Cymek said:

It’s also interesting to see what types of plants or trees you can try and grow in your backyard.
A couple of them are struggling the coffee plant for example and the pineapple doesn’t like it when it rains a lot.
Also going to try a grow peanuts for something different

nice

I have a pine apple plant in the front yard still and the backyard one went to compost after fruiting. The pineapple was good tasting though. :-)

Cymek said:

It’s also interesting to see what types of plants or trees you can try and grow in your backyard.
A couple of them are struggling the coffee plant for example and the pineapple doesn’t like it when it rains a lot.
Also going to try a grow peanuts for something different

Even without this forum, I find enough nuts to keep me amused…

monkey skipper said:

Cymek said:

It’s also interesting to see what types of plants or trees you can try and grow in your backyard.
A couple of them are struggling the coffee plant for example and the pineapple doesn’t like it when it rains a lot.
Also going to try a grow peanuts for something different

nice

I have a pine apple plant in the front yard still and the backyard one went to compost after fruiting. The pineapple was good tasting though. :-)

I can imagine it would be really nice fresh, slow growing aren’t they mine is probably 2 and half years old, still quite small.

Cymek said:

monkey skipper said:

Cymek said:

It’s also interesting to see what types of plants or trees you can try and grow in your backyard.
A couple of them are struggling the coffee plant for example and the pineapple doesn’t like it when it rains a lot.
Also going to try a grow peanuts for something different

nice

I have a pine apple plant in the front yard still and the backyard one went to compost after fruiting. The pineapple was good tasting though. :-)

I can imagine it would be really nice fresh, slow growing aren’t they mine is probably 2 and half years old, still quite small.

they are supposed to fruit after the 2 year mark . Mine was planted in full sun in a tub on the back lawn shallow soil did not bother it much. the one in the front does not get as much full sun not fruit as yet and they were planted around the same time.

I don’t think the ecology of plants work in the way portrayed. There are so many variables as to be impossible to accurately determine the reason for a long living tree, compared to a slow growing one.
Some of these variables are:

Climate: Amount of rainfall. Time of rainfall (seasonal or spread over the year). Regular or irregular rainfall. Temperature variation, warm, cold or highly variable.

Soil type, sand, clay, rock, mixture, etc. Soil depth. Moisture holding ability, poor, good, water-logging, etc. The availability of soil microbes that make nutrients available to the roots.

Pests and diseases, these are often controlled by environmental conditions like cold winters, unusually wet or dry seasons, any changes to the environment can assist some with some, or eliminate others.

Stability of the environment over extended periods, rapid change can destroy all or part of the habitat along with the trees.

Plus there are many more factors that affect the life of plants. Some trees in harsh conditions are often very “slow growing” and survive for centuries, also there are “fast growing” forest eucalypts that also span many centuries. In non-eucalypt forests, seedlings can remain seedlings for many years until an older trees falls, then with this stimulus grow exceptionally fast in competition with other seedlings to be the first to dominate the light and growing space afforded by this opportunity.

Trees evolve to take advantage of their environment and an important factor to length of life would be the stability of the habitat, or any changes happen very slowly for them to adapt to the new conditions. There is no simple answer.

PermeateFree said:

I don’t think the ecology of plants work in the way portrayed. There are so many variables as to be impossible to accurately determine the reason for a long living tree, compared to a slow growing one.
Some of these variables are:

Climate: Amount of rainfall. Time of rainfall (seasonal or spread over the year). Regular or irregular rainfall. Temperature variation, warm, cold or highly variable.

Soil type, sand, clay, rock, mixture, etc. Soil depth. Moisture holding ability, poor, good, water-logging, etc. The availability of soil microbes that make nutrients available to the roots.

Pests and diseases, these are often controlled by environmental conditions like cold winters, unusually wet or dry seasons, any changes to the environment can assist some with some, or eliminate others.

Stability of the environment over extended periods, rapid change can destroy all or part of the habitat along with the trees.

Plus there are many more factors that affect the life of plants. Some trees in harsh conditions are often very “slow growing” and survive for centuries, also there are “fast growing” forest eucalypts that also span many centuries. In non-eucalypt forests, seedlings can remain seedlings for many years until an older trees falls, then with this stimulus grow exceptionally fast in competition with other seedlings to be the first to dominate the light and growing space afforded by this opportunity.

Trees evolve to take advantage of their environment and an important factor to length of life would be the stability of the habitat, or any changes happen very slowly for them to adapt to the new conditions. There is no simple answer.

You missed “genetics”.

Whether a tree CAN grow to an extreme age is governed by genetics.
Whether a tree that can grow to an extreme age WILL is governed by environment.

For example, a tree living in a non-native environment will live longer because it will avoid diseases that have co-evolved with it.

For example, a tree living in an extreme (for example lack of liquid water) environment may live longer because the extreme environment could kill off diseases.

AwesomeO said:

Cymek said:

Its quite satisfying to move into a new house and plant trees and see them grow over the years.
We had nothing and now have over 30 trees (mostly fruit and nut) on our block.

Pffft, roughy has planted over a million.

easily.

PermeateFree said:

I don’t think the ecology of plants work in the way portrayed. There are so many variables as to be impossible to accurately determine the reason for a long living tree, compared to a slow growing one.
Some of these variables are:

Climate: Amount of rainfall. Time of rainfall (seasonal or spread over the year). Regular or irregular rainfall. Temperature variation, warm, cold or highly variable.

Soil type, sand, clay, rock, mixture, etc. Soil depth. Moisture holding ability, poor, good, water-logging, etc. The availability of soil microbes that make nutrients available to the roots.

Pests and diseases, these are often controlled by environmental conditions like cold winters, unusually wet or dry seasons, any changes to the environment can assist some with some, or eliminate others.

Stability of the environment over extended periods, rapid change can destroy all or part of the habitat along with the trees.

Plus there are many more factors that affect the life of plants. Some trees in harsh conditions are often very “slow growing” and survive for centuries, also there are “fast growing” forest eucalypts that also span many centuries. In non-eucalypt forests, seedlings can remain seedlings for many years until an older trees falls, then with this stimulus grow exceptionally fast in competition with other seedlings to be the first to dominate the light and growing space afforded by this opportunity.

Trees evolve to take advantage of their environment and an important factor to length of life would be the stability of the habitat, or any changes happen very slowly for them to adapt to the new conditions. There is no simple answer.

You’ve made some good points PF.

Whatever sciences the rest here are good at, most have no idea about how nature works at all.

Evolution does have its part to play and this is why it is best to leave things the way they were as much as we can, otherwise we are throwing our own spanner into the works. It beggars belief that we believe we can pull all the natives out and plant exotics. This also comers down to moving Australian natives around into new environments.

Many science disciplines tried to destroy the ideals of Bill Mollison. He laboured to explain that his was not a clearly defined discipline but a system of linking the knowledge of the disciplines.

To get back to the OP. The speed of the gowth of the tree has little to do with its longevity.

Now. Old trees. Where are they found? Nowhere near where man has been clearing forests. Often they are only found as a result of destroying all the scientific evidence of how they came to be there and have survived for so long.

None of the known science has been able to learn or otherwise know why these trees lived for thousands of years. Tree ring dating only works for the bits of the tree that are currently growing above ground. eg: many trees can survive from lignotubers and continue to replace the above ground growth. The roots mmay have been alive for many centuries bbut the parts harvested or drilled to count tree rings may only have been alive a fraction of that.

monkey skipper said:

As far as I am aware there are two types of growth patterns for trees i.e. fast growing and slow growing.

basicly there are fast and slow growing trees but this has little to do with their longevity.

monkey skipper said:

My understanding of fast growing trees is that their cycle is short compared to the slower growth trees. One example , I can think of is a wattle variety of tree that has a rapid growth period that lasts approx 7 – 12 years from memory and then the tree will die back and in some cases literally fall down.

Many wattles are considered to be afforestation species. ie: the first to colonise after disasters that devastate the environment. These are often shrubby plants or small trees. There are also many wattles that grow to be ancient giants of the forest. I can show you Yarran trees that are 25 to 30 metres to the first branch.

My question is this…. do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense? There are some trees that are now living that have reached thousands of years of age as a single organism.

The Wollemi pine is considered one large living organism (I believe) because all of the plants have the same genome.

I was reading about a Boboa Tree in Africa the other day and the trees have to separate growth patterns as they age one is the bulbous growth and then there is the secondary growth period where the middle of the plant hollows out but the outer wall of the tree continues to draw up water and nutrient. There is one example of this tree species that has been growing for approx 1700 years or probably longer than that.

Do they yet know if a slow growing tree die at some point or grow indefinitely? Is there enough evidence to know this answer as yet?

roughbarked said:

monkey skipper said:

As far as I am aware there are two types of growth patterns for trees i.e. fast growing and slow growing.

basicly there are fast and slow growing trees but this has little to do with their longevity.

monkey skipper said:

My understanding of fast growing trees is that their cycle is short compared to the slower growth trees. One example , I can think of is a wattle variety of tree that has a rapid growth period that lasts approx 7 – 12 years from memory and then the tree will die back and in some cases literally fall down.

Many wattles are considered to be afforestation species. ie: the first to colonise after disasters that devastate the environment. These are often shrubby plants or small trees. There are also many wattles that grow to be ancient giants of the forest. I can show you Yarran trees that are 25 to 30 metres to the first branch.
monkey skipper said:

My question is this…. do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense? There are some trees that are now living that have reached thousands of years of age as a single organism.

There are no known caps other than local disaster. ie the the recent forest fires in Tasmania burnt out areas that hadn’t been burned in our known history. These disasters invariably leave survivors that do go on to last millennia whilst also destroying those that had already been alive for longer than known history. Many times this has happened with no science recorded at all.
monkey skipper said:

The Wollemi pine is considered one large living organism (I believe) because all of the plants have the same genome.

I was reading about a Boboa Tree in Africa the other day and the trees have to separate growth patterns as they age one is the bulbous growth and then there is the secondary growth period where the middle of the plant hollows out but the outer wall of the tree continues to draw up water and nutrient. There is one example of this tree species that has been growing for approx 1700 years or probably longer than that.

Do they yet know if a slow growing tree die at some point or grow indefinitely? Is there enough evidence to know this answer as yet?

It is not uncommon to find that ancient species are the result of one organism propagating itself after such disasters as mentioned above.

We are speculating that the age of the pine trees sm mentions is at 10.500 years because we have evidence of that found in pollen grains found in rock strata that was carbon dated. We know they had the same DNA due to the same pollen grains found on the lake surface. We also know by the same pollen on the lake surface that approximately the same amount of pollen had been dumped on the lake for at least 10,500 years. Which leads us to believe that the same amount of this single clone has survived intact for at least 10,500 years. Further study could reveal more if we hadn’t caused the climate to become so finicky.

A mallee tree may well be many thousands of years older than we could possibly imagine. The lignotubers highly prized for their energy value (mallee roots), acatually propagate themselves in an ever expanding circle of growth under the soil. The shoots and leaves they put on may reach full height within a decade or two but what is going on below the soil may well have been going on for many millennia.

What we do know is that the greatest reason that trees don’t survive is down to man and his various methods of killing trees.

That we now have scientists attempting to measure the effects that climate change does have on the growth or survival and evolution of plants can only be a good thing. It is generic of science that it learns most from things that are dead. It would be good to get a fresh approach on what is living.

We know why there is a forest known as the new forest.
It should also be clear as to why it is easier to get a veneered piece of walnut than a solid piece.
Planting walnut trees in Australia is unlikely to change this within a period of less than 250 years and only if someone planted a forest destined to be harvested 500 years or more in the future.

We also know that the olive trees of Palestine which had fed the people for all of known history, were pushed aside for new developments to put more Israeli’s into housing. This insult alone will have ripples for millennia yet.

mollwollfumble said:

I’m not an expert on this. By “fast growing” and “slow growing” do you mean “softwood” and “hardwood”? I ask because although the fastest growth occurs in softwoods, the slowest growth can also occur in softwoods.

and the fastest growing hardwoods show the same.

Damn it. There are too many variations.
mollwollfumble said:

“Although its exact age cannot be verified, the Olive Tree of Vouves might be the oldest among them, estimated at over 3,000 years old. It still produces olives, and they are highly prized.” It’s possible to take cuttings from very old olive trees, such cuttings are genetically identical to the original so can be considered to be the same tree as the original. Such cuttings have a new zest for life.

Any clone may be considered to be the same age as the tree was when it was taken but when it is planted somewhere else, it in essence becomes a new life.

mollwollfumble said:

> do slow growing trees have a life expectancy that is capped in a true sense?

I suspect that the only organisms with a true capped life expectancy are those that stop growing at some point in their lives. Mammals do. Some fish don’t, their rate of growth decreases with age but they never stop growing completely. Some clams don’t. I also suspect that some trees don’t.

Your suspicions are easily confirmed if anyone looks at the issue.

There is still so much about life itself that science as yet not been able or even desired to learn. Let alone what has been studied yet has missed so much.
A recent discovery of a species of mangrove previously undescribed by a layman rather than a botanist, is but one example.

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

I don’t think the ecology of plants work in the way portrayed. There are so many variables as to be impossible to accurately determine the reason for a long living tree, compared to a slow growing one.
Some of these variables are:

Climate: Amount of rainfall. Time of rainfall (seasonal or spread over the year). Regular or irregular rainfall. Temperature variation, warm, cold or highly variable.

Soil type, sand, clay, rock, mixture, etc. Soil depth. Moisture holding ability, poor, good, water-logging, etc. The availability of soil microbes that make nutrients available to the roots.

Pests and diseases, these are often controlled by environmental conditions like cold winters, unusually wet or dry seasons, any changes to the environment can assist some with some, or eliminate others.

Stability of the environment over extended periods, rapid change can destroy all or part of the habitat along with the trees.

Plus there are many more factors that affect the life of plants. Some trees in harsh conditions are often very “slow growing” and survive for centuries, also there are “fast growing” forest eucalypts that also span many centuries. In non-eucalypt forests, seedlings can remain seedlings for many years until an older trees falls, then with this stimulus grow exceptionally fast in competition with other seedlings to be the first to dominate the light and growing space afforded by this opportunity.

Trees evolve to take advantage of their environment and an important factor to length of life would be the stability of the habitat, or any changes happen very slowly for them to adapt to the new conditions. There is no simple answer.

You missed “genetics”.

Whether a tree CAN grow to an extreme age is governed by genetics.
Whether a tree that can grow to an extreme age WILL is governed by environment.

For example, a tree living in a non-native environment will live longer because it will avoid diseases that have co-evolved with it.

For example, a tree living in an extreme (for example lack of liquid water) environment may live longer because the extreme environment could kill off diseases.

Genetics is governed by what has gone before and the first adaptation of an organism would be to a new environment. If its genes permit it to survive in a particular habitat, then over time favorable genes will be enhanced. You don’t get a seedling from one environment developing into a large long lived tree in another. Jack and the beanstalk is a myth.

PermeateFree said:

mollwollfumble said:

PermeateFree said:

I don’t think the ecology of plants work in the way portrayed. There are so many variables as to be impossible to accurately determine the reason for a long living tree, compared to a slow growing one.
Some of these variables are:

Climate: Amount of rainfall. Time of rainfall (seasonal or spread over the year). Regular or irregular rainfall. Temperature variation, warm, cold or highly variable.

Soil type, sand, clay, rock, mixture, etc. Soil depth. Moisture holding ability, poor, good, water-logging, etc. The availability of soil microbes that make nutrients available to the roots.

Pests and diseases, these are often controlled by environmental conditions like cold winters, unusually wet or dry seasons, any changes to the environment can assist some with some, or eliminate others.

Stability of the environment over extended periods, rapid change can destroy all or part of the habitat along with the trees.

Plus there are many more factors that affect the life of plants. Some trees in harsh conditions are often very “slow growing” and survive for centuries, also there are “fast growing” forest eucalypts that also span many centuries. In non-eucalypt forests, seedlings can remain seedlings for many years until an older trees falls, then with this stimulus grow exceptionally fast in competition with other seedlings to be the first to dominate the light and growing space afforded by this opportunity.

Trees evolve to take advantage of their environment and an important factor to length of life would be the stability of the habitat, or any changes happen very slowly for them to adapt to the new conditions. There is no simple answer.

You missed “genetics”.

Whether a tree CAN grow to an extreme age is governed by genetics.
Whether a tree that can grow to an extreme age WILL is governed by environment.

For example, a tree living in a non-native environment will live longer because it will avoid diseases that have co-evolved with it.

For example, a tree living in an extreme (for example lack of liquid water) environment may live longer because the extreme environment could kill off diseases.

Genetics is governed by what has gone before and the first adaptation of an organism would be to a new environment. If its genes permit it to survive in a particular habitat, then over time favorable genes will be enhanced. You don’t get a seedling from one environment developing into a large long lived tree in another. Jack and the beanstalk is a myth.

Although I didn’t read every word of this old fred;

I didn’t see an “ALL Of The ABOVE” cause of demise.

More often than not, trees eventually succumb to a combination of negative factors,
each weakening the tree (or many organisms) each making the tree more vulnerable
to the next factor that contributes to it’s eventually demise.

..as roughie correctly pointed out, a climate changing faster than the tree’s ability to adapt
is far too often the proverbial “straw that breaks the camel’s back” in a long series of
accumulative contributing factors that stress the tree beyond it’s ability to bounce back.

In my area I see acres of end-stage forest die-back… especially on mountain tops..
often starting with thin soil that becomes nutrient poor, further weakened by pollution,
the amount of rainfall drops off, then the stressed trees become targeted by borers..
at that stage, it may only takes a few degrees of night time temperatures change
and within only a year or two, the entire once thriving forest becomes a tinderbox.

Ogmog said:

PermeateFree said:

mollwollfumble said:

You missed “genetics”.

Whether a tree CAN grow to an extreme age is governed by genetics.
Whether a tree that can grow to an extreme age WILL is governed by environment.

For example, a tree living in a non-native environment will live longer because it will avoid diseases that have co-evolved with it.

For example, a tree living in an extreme (for example lack of liquid water) environment may live longer because the extreme environment could kill off diseases.

Genetics is governed by what has gone before and the first adaptation of an organism would be to a new environment. If its genes permit it to survive in a particular habitat, then over time favorable genes will be enhanced. You don’t get a seedling from one environment developing into a large long lived tree in another. Jack and the beanstalk is a myth.

Although I didn’t read every word of this old fred;

I didn’t see an “ALL Of The ABOVE” cause of demise.

More often than not, trees eventually succumb to a combination of negative factors,
each weakening the tree (or many organisms) each making the tree more vulnerable
to the next factor that contributes to it’s eventually demise.

..as roughie correctly pointed out, a climate changing faster than the tree’s ability to adapt
is far too often the proverbial “straw that breaks the camel’s back” in a long series of
accumulative contributing factors that stress the tree beyond it’s ability to bounce back.

In my area I see acres of end-stage forest die-back… especially on mountain tops..
often starting with thin soil that becomes nutrient poor, further weakened by pollution,
the amount of rainfall drops off, then the stressed trees become targeted by borers..
at that stage, it may only takes a few degrees of night time temperatures change
and within only a year or two, the entire once thriving forest becomes a tinderbox.

Life of most organisms is complex, only engineers look for a single cause.