While there are only 80,000 of those iconic giant redwoods left in their native California (I blame all those rubbish speedbike riders in Return of the Jedi), there are 500,000 now growing in the UK.
Smaller so far, given that they’re much younger, but apparently the warm wet weather conditions suit them well & the largest are already over 50 metres tall.
@markmccaughrean I honestly don’t know where that 80k number comes from. Maybe at the nadir of the logging era? Or are they mixing up redwoods and sequoias? (The latter only grow in the Sierra and are a lot more threatened but it’s not the ones that are thriving on the UK).
I have probably walked past more than 80k redwoods myself. A lot of their logged range just sprouted again once left alone and is thriving. They survive fires better than anything else in the forest and grow in an area that isn’t very affected by climate change so far since the nearby ocean keeps things more stable than elsewhere.
It’s pretty cool that there’s a bunch of them in the UK though. I wonder if they’d grow well in Galicia and northern Portugal.
@MyLittleMetroid@markmccaughrean The article talks specifically about giant redwoods / sequoia (Sequoiadendron giganteum), but the linked Royal Society paper says that the UK number of 500,000 trees also includes coastal redwoods (Sequoia sempervirens). How many of the latter there are in California & the PNW, I can’t immediately find, but perhaps many more.
@MyLittleMetroid@markmccaughrean Yeah, I was going to say that number sounded a little off. Do they mean redwoods, Giant Sequoias or just regular sequoias, because Costco is selling 10ft sequoia saplings right now.
@markmccaughrean@lisamelton wonder if they'll also stay smaller no matter how long they live, because they're not getting all that salmony protein goodness they get in the PNW… (though not sure the salmon thing applies in California)
@markmccaughrean Very interesting! And I feel like the piece could have been rounded out with some speculation on how those beautiful and potentially very long-lived trees will do after, for instance, the AMOC fails. Rosy mentions of 2,000 year lifespans without adding climate change context or caveats just feels like gaslighting now
@nowster Yes, I spotted that part of the story & it surprised me. Can they be “helped” to reproduce locally or have all 500,000 trees been grown from imported fertilised seeds?
@markmccaughrean I listened to that this morning - so interesting to hear! One of those 500,000 #giantredwoods is at New Cross Gate station in London, olanrd by a rail worker a few years ago. Hope it will continue to thrive!
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