Mastodawn

Mark McCaughrean Mar 13, 2024

Who knew? 😳

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.

Story & pix by my lovely friends Becky Morelle, Ali Francis, & Tony Jolliffe at the BBC: https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-68518623

Giant redwoods: World’s largest trees 'thriving in UK'

A survey of giant redwoods growing in the UK reveals the trees are doing well - and growing fast.

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Óscar Morales Vivó Mar 13, 2024

@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.

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Samhain Night

@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.