Pando, the largest organism in the world, is dying thanks to humans – Quartz

At first glance, Pando is unimpressed. If you do not look for it, you can easily walk in front of the homogeneous forest of stems ranging from a few inches to about 30 meters (about 30 meters) tall – the larger ones look more like trunks – all with matching leaves, on one of the few roads leading to Fish Lake in southern Utah.

But if you stop on the lake path and give it more than a second, you may recognize that you are standing in front of the world's largest living organism, a colony of more than 47,000 cedars quivering identical. all connected by a single root system covering more than 100 hectares. Scientists think it's the largest isolated organism in the world. When my partner and I stopped in front of a part of it last week, Pando's leaves were all yellow for the fall. It was snowing and serene, and at the same time presented a humble and humbling spectacle.

Scientists do not know how long Pando has been alive, but it is estimated that his birth took place between 80,000 years and over a million years ago. Individual stems can live more than 130 years. The death of a stem indicates to the root system that it is time to cultivate another. Like the hair on our heads, the ages of each identical stem vary, so that the colony remains sturdy even if a few die.

And yet, his days may be dwindling. A recent study by Utah environmentalists suggests that for about 40 years Pando has not been able to effectively repel his stems.

"People are at the center of this failure," said Paul Rogers, ecologist of Utah State University and co-author of the article. Pastoralists nearby have allowed their livestock to roam voraciously on young stalks and, as the human population has increased in the region, deer hunting has declined for safety reasons. But thriving deer populations are wreaking havoc on young cedar stems. Over the last 40 years, it appears that the root system has not been able to reproduce fast enough to follow the decimation.

Rogers and Darren McAvoy, also of the University of Utah, have studied aerial images of the tree system dating back to 1939 and found that clearing cedar stems for human development purposes had prevented Pando from repopulating in certain areas for three or four decades. They also investigated parts of Pando between 2016 and 2017 to examine the general state of health of the tree and used the scatter as evidence of the intrusion of deer and deer. livestock.

Some areas of Pando were closed on an experimental basis in 2013 and 2014; these showed signs of much healthier regrowth. To help Pando survive in the long term, humans will have to install a more complete and better fence, eliminate some of the deer and make sure the cattle are not grazing in the area, Rogers said in New York. Times (paywall).

Saving Pando would be a feat for conservation; If scientists are able to protect this colony, they will probably be able to use similar tactics to protect other endangered forest ecosystems. On the other hand, his death would be a massive failure in the protection of one of the most remarkable forms of life on earth, which has existed for longer than modern humanity.