Scientists Recently Uncovered The Fossilized Remnants Of The Oldest Forest In The World Located In A Quaint Upstate New York Town
Trees have admirably long lifespans. The forests they make up can be traced back to hundreds of millions of years ago.
Recently, scientists have found the fossilized remnants of the world’s oldest forest. It was located at the bottom of an abandoned sandstone quarry in Cairo, a small town in upstate New York beside the Catskill Mountain range.
The network of ancient trees may have once spanned 250 miles. The 385-million-year-old rocks in the quarry contain the fossilized roots of the trees, which has given researchers clues about the events that have led to the atmosphere we know today. The site was first discovered in 2009, and studies have remained ongoing.
Some of the fossilized roots were over 36 feet in length, spreading out from where the tree trunks once stood. They seemed to belong to Archaeopteris, a species of large, woody tree with flattened green leaves that sprout from frond-like branches and is related to modern trees.
Previously, the oldest Archaeopteris fossils were 365 million years old. It is unclear when the tree began evolving to include the features of trees today.
The complex root systems at the Cairo site indicate that the evolution of Archaeopteris occurred 20 million years ago. In the past, it was assumed that trees of this kind did not evolve so early on. The trees found in Cairo had a huge effect on the climate back then.
Their deep roots penetrated the soil and broke up the rocks beneath it, a process that geologists call “weathering.”
During this process, carbon dioxide is pulled from the atmosphere and turned into carbonate ions in groundwater. The groundwater runs off into the sea and is eventually stored as limestone.
As a result of weathering, carbon dioxide levels experienced a decrease, allowing for oxygen levels to rise. This may have led to the evolution of giant insects and other larger animals that lived in the ancient forests.
demerzel21 – stock.adobe.com – illustrative purposes only
The Cairo forest is a 40-minute drive away from another fossil forest in Gilboa, New York, which was discovered in the 19th century and contains 382-million-year-old specimens.
Its trees also had an impact on the modern climate. The fossilized remains of this forest actually supplied the coal that was used to fuel the Industrial Revolution.
Until now, the Gilboa fossil forest was thought to be the oldest forest in the world. Since 2010, scientists have been investigating a quarry at Gilboa that also preserved ancient tree roots.
However, the Gilboa roots didn’t produce deep, woody roots that could cause weathering. Instead, they appeared to belong to a different family of trees related to ferns and horsetails.
This means the Cairo trees were the ones that shifted the plant’s climate and paved the way for humans to thrive on Earth.
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