Oldest Forest in the World Discovered in England, Researchers Say

By Robbert van der Linde

Mar 9, 2024 at 7:58 AM Update: 30 minutes ago

Scientists from Cambridge and Cardiff Universities say to have found the oldest forest in the world. The Petrified Forest is located in the southwestern tip of England and is almost 400 million years old.

The forest was found near the high cliffs near the town of Minehead. According to the researchers, the fossils of the trees are about 390 million years old. This makes the forest approximately four million years older than the previous ‘record holder’, a forest in the American state of New York.

The trees do not resemble trees as we know them today, the geologists write in the journal Journal of the Geological Society. The primeval forest consists of a ‘prototype’ tree, which most resembles a modern palm tree.

The trees had thin bark and were hollow on the inside. They also had no leaves, but their branches were covered with hundreds of twigs. They were about 2 to 4 meters high, significantly smaller than trees today.

“This was a pretty strange forest. It wouldn’t have looked like forests as we know them today,” said lead researcher Neil Davies. “There were no plants or grass. But the trees and the twigs they dropped on the ground had a major impact on the landscape.”

The forest was found on the coast of the English county of Somerset. Photo: Neil Davies

Beeld: University of Cambridge

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ScienceNature
2024-03-09 06:58:11
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