General Facts
Following thousands of additions in recent years, over 70,000 tree species are confirmed to exist worldwide, which is quite amazing! Sadly, global warming currently threatens around 18,000.
We produce the carbon dioxide that trees breathe. In return, they give us the oxygen that we breathe. Nature is amazing!
Ivy, which commonly grows on trees, was often featured on premises to indicate that they made or sold beer.
450 million years ago in the Ordovician Era, before trees evolved, the Earth's landscape appears to have been inhabited by giant fungi forests some 29 feet tall, and fossils have been found worldwide. In Saudi Arabia in 2008, one of them — a protocaxite — was the first mycelium, discovered in 1843. (See World of Warcraft 'Zangarmarsh' for likely appearance.)
The island of Socotra in Yemen contains many endemic tree species — i.e. they are found nowhere else on Earth — many of which have a totally unique, beautiful appearance. Sadly, several of these species are considered endangered.
The term 'conifer' means 'cone bearer', originating from the Latin 'conus' (cone) and 'ferre' (to bear).
When leaves begin to change colour in the autumn, the tree releases hormone designed to take the last sugars out of the tree to help it through the winter.
Trees had already existed for 50 million years incl. during the Carboniferous Period before conifers began to appear.
Acorns and nuts (especially from Beeches) fall directly beneath the tree, but are carried by Jays to other areas.
Most trees grow with a slight spiral twist in the trunk, which makes them extra strong against wind shearing, i.e. stops them bending.
Cells in a tree are known as Cambium and those inside the bark are known as Xylem (woody) and darker, tougher hardwood is made from dead cells reinforced with lignum, tannins and other toughening chemicals. The cells on the outside are known as Pholem and transport water, sugars and minerals through the bark.
Britain was re-colonised by trees some 12,000 years ago, after the last Ice Age.
It was reported on 3 Feb 2024 that a 350 million year old ancient forest has been uncovered in New Brunswick, Canada of a unique 3D crown shape at Sanford Quarry in the Canadian Maritime Area. It has been named Sanfordiacaulis densifolia and had an unusual spiky trunk. This fossil find in the rock determined that they were 10 metres high with the leaves of 200 fronds resembling tropical tree ferns today. Scientists have determined that there was an earthquake that buried parts of the forest in rock, hence they have survived.
A 390m year old "fossil forest" has been found recently, the oldest yet. It is of Cladoxylopsida related to ferns and Sphenopside (horsetails) looking like modern-day ferns and standing 6 1/2 to 18 ft tall, in the Hangman Sandstone Formation, which is 1700m thick in its folded, uplifted sandstone structure at Glenthore Beach, Combe Martin, North Portland, Exmoor, Devon - the landmass then was at the Equator, the land then being in the continental area known as Laurentia, in the Emsian Period. These trees are thought to have created river channels that helped develop plants and habitat to evolve life on Earth.