Methuselah (tree)


Methuselah is a -year-old Great Basin bristlecone pine tree growing high in the White Mountains of Inyo County in eastern California. It is recognized as the non-clonal tree with the greatest confirmed age in the world.

Geography

Methuselah is located between above sea level in the "Methuselah Grove" in the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest within the Inyo National Forest. Its exact location is a closely guarded secret, known only to a select few.

Status as oldest known tree

Methuselah was 4,789 years old when sampled by Edmund Schulman and Tom Harlan, with an estimated germination date of 2833 BC. Since this tree ages back to this date, using tree rings, research shows precipitation patterns that date back to 1983 BC.

Other bristlecones

Another bristlecone specimen, WPN-114, nicknamed "Prometheus", was more than 4,844 years old when cut down in 1964, with an estimated germination date of 2880 BC. A dendrochronology, based on these trees and other bristlecone pine samples, extends back to about 9000 BC, albeit with a single gap of about 500 years.
An older bristlecone pine was reportedly discovered by Tom Harlan in 2009, based on a sample core collected in 1957. According to Harlan, the tree was 5,062 years old and still living in 2010. However, neither the tree nor the sample core could be located after Harlan's death in 2013.

Clonal organisms

Other, longer-lived organisms are clonal colonies, such as the 80,000-year-old quaking aspen colony named "Pando" in the Fish Lake National Forest in south-central Utah; the 11,700-year- old creosote bush colony, named "King Clone", in the Mojave Desert near the Lucerne Valley in California; and the 9,500-year-old Norway spruce colony named "Old Tjikko" in Sweden. Methuselah, however, is the oldest known non-clonal organism.