Record Colonies
A group of 47,000 Quaking Aspen (Populus tremuloides) trees (nicknamed "Pando") in the Wasatch Mountains, Utah, USA, has been shown to be a single clone connected by the root system. It is sometimes considered the world's largest organism by mass, covering 106 acres (43 ha). It is possible that other unknown clonal colonies of trees rival or exceed its size.
The only known plant of King's Lomatia (Lomatia tasmanica) in Tasmania is a clonal colony estimated to be 43,600 years old. Another possible candidate for oldest organism on earth is a stand of the marine plant Posidonia oceanica in the Mediterranean Sea, which could be up to 100,000 years of age.
Read more about this topic: Clonal Colony
Famous quotes containing the words record and/or colonies:
“He will not idly dance at his work who has wood to cut and cord before nightfall in the short days of winter; but every stroke will be husbanded, and ring soberly through the wood; and so will the strokes of that scholar’s pen, which at evening record the story of the day, ring soberly, yet cheerily, on the ear of the reader, long after the echoes of his axe have died away.”
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“So that’s our new flag. The thing we’ve been fighting for—thirteen stripes for the colonies and thirteen stars in a circle for the union.”
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