Researchers found in Mountains Pindus in the north of Greece an ancient trees grove. Dozen of thousand-year pines of Geldreykh include one copy which took root to the earth at least 1075 years ago. It does it by the acknowledged tree of Europe oldest officially.
Leader of expedition Paul Dzh. Kruzik reports that the research of rings of ancient trees will be useful in climate change tracking.
To learn age of the oldest tree, team of researchers from the Arizonian university (USA), the Mainz university (Germany) and the Stockholm university (Sweden) without serious consequences took a sample of a kernel of a tree with a diameter only 5 mm. Scientists counted rings to calculate age of a tree. According to Kruzik, a tree which received a name Adonis, actually, is much more senior. “We didn’t reach the center — he added. — Therefore it is definitely more senior”.
Though in Europe there are older trees, many of them are estimated only visually, the age isn’t checked by quantity of rings. Besides, Adonis is the youth in comparison with an awned intermountain pine (5 thousand years) to White Mountains in California or the Sacred fig (2,3 thousand years) in Sri Lanka.
And still safety of a grove surprises. “I am impressed that this tree has passed through all human history, all empires — Byzantine, Ottoman — lives of all people living in this region — Kruzik adds. — So many things could lead to his death. Fortunately, this wood was touched for thousands of years”.
