3,500 Year Old Florida Tree Dies of Natural Causes

hondo77 writes with an excerpt from The Daily "'Mother Nature claimed one of her oldest living specimens (Monday) in a freak fire that destroyed a 3,500-year-old bald cypress tree towering over central Florida. Known as "The Senator," or simply "The Big Tree," the hollowed-out majestic timber, standing at 118 feet tall, ignited before dawn. Firefighters watched helplessly as the oldest tree east of the Mississippi — and the fifth oldest in the world — blazed and then collapsed in a heap of flaming embers.' The fire likely started by 'either a weeks- old lightning strike that smoldered until combustion occured, or friction caused by buffeting winds that ignited a spark and erupted in flames.'"

If only trees could talk

[elrous0]

This one would have had a TON of boring stories about animals walking by.

Mixed feelings

[GameboyRMH]

On one hand one of the oldest trees in the world is no more, but on the other hand a Senator died in a fire...

Re:

[Fjandr]

If only this would happen to all the Senators. Maybe they'll all be struck by lightning and burst into flames a few days later. One can only dream...

Re:

[mcgrew]

Well, I've found that there are no boring stories, only boring writers. How well did that old tree write, anyway?

Re:If only trees could talk

[hvm2hvm]

Depends on how you process the wood to turn into paper.

Re:

[fredrated]

Wow, you sure get a lot of first posts. Are you retired?

Re:

[Rogerborg]

My theory is that it's a very small shell script. We should use it to replace one of the legacy "editor" scripts, it's not even remotely credible that they're really humans.

Re:

[uigrad_2000]

Stories appear on the firehose [slashdot.org] before making it to the first page. You can actually post to the slashdot article before it goes live on the first page, using that method.

For example, here's an example of someone making a first post before the article goes live:
http://slashdot.org/journal/277269/couple-links-that-dont-appear-to-work-any-more [slashdot.org]

Re:

[uigrad_2000]

Oops, wish I could take back that comment.

The "article" that I linked above is actually a journal. I forgot that they show up in the firehose also.

Re:

[mister_playboy]

The asterisk by his name means he is a /. subscriber.

He can see stories and prepare a post before the story goes live for everyone else.

It's the non-subscribers who gets lots of first posts you need to watch out for.

Re:

[rubycodez]

but think of all the exciting revelations in news stories it could have told, featuring that bears shit in the woods

Re:

[elrous0]

Kids: Tell us about the Revolutionary War!

Tree: The what?

Kids: You know, what were George Washington and Abraham Lincoln like in person? That sort of stuff!

Tree: Yeah, I pretty much just stand here in the woods. I can tell you about that time an eagle made a nest in one of my branches, though.

Kids: But what of the Civil War?

Tree: I don't think you're getting it...

Re:

[wiedzmin]

I think it would also disagree with the article title... A tree burning down is as much "dying of natural causes" as someone "dying from an allergic reaction" to lead, after being shot 6 times in the head.

Re:

[yurtinus]

In this case, since the investigation found the fire was caused either by lightning strike or some strange circumstance (not arson) - it would be more like dying from an allergic reaction to bee stings. Still relatively natural.

It's an omen!

[K. S. Kyosuke]

What's the year again? (Observe confirmation bias to have a smash year this year.)

Re:

[Anrego]

A good omen? :(

I guess omens are rarely good.. especially when they involve things burning :(

Too little too late

[Anonymous Coward]

I live right by the park, I could have thrown a rock at the tree. It happened January 16th, this story is old.

Re:

[Shotgun]

I live halfway up the US coast in North Carolina. I too could have thrown a rock at the tree.

Wouldn't have hit it, but....

8*)

Natural Causes

[batquux]

Natural causes? Freak fire? Which is it?

Re:Natural Causes

[GameboyRMH]

To a tree a freak fire IS "natural causes." Just as being eaten by lions is "natural causes" to a zebra.

Re:Natural Causes

[multisync]

To a tree a freak fire IS "natural causes." Just as being eaten by lions is "natural causes" to a zebra

I suppose any death is by "natural causes," unless one dies at the hands of some supernatural entity.

Re:

[Riceballsan]

Heroin is a natural plant, so an OD is natural causes by that logic. I believe natural causes is supposed to imply the body just wearing out on it's own and not caused by outside stimulants. Getting struck by lightning is pretty equally lethal for trees and humans alike. But I've never seen a death certificate attribute being struck by lightning a natural cause.

Re:Natural Causes

[Anonymous Coward]

Agree. Better title would have been "oldest tree dies of smoking related causes.".

Re:Natural Causes

[elrous0]

Damn you, Phillip Morris!!!

Re:Natural Causes

[kungfugleek]

Yes. Trees need to keep the smoke inside. If you let the smoke out, they die.

Re:

[hedleyroos]

It was so old it was bald.

Re:

[batquux]

Nah, it's just that "freak" fire kinda suggests otherwise to me.

Re:Natural Causes

[SJHillman]

If a person were to die in a naturally caused forest fire, it's generally not attributed to natural causes. It's attributed to burning in a fire.

Re:

[tompaulco]

Are you suggesting that a knife, made from materials that came from the earth, is not natural? What about bullets?
it's all a line-drawing game. In reality, there is no such thing as "unnatural", unless you are a believer in the supernatural. However, human beings and their inventions, processes, and affects are considered to be either a part of nature or apart from nature depending on the current agenda at hand.

Friction Caused by Buffeting Winds?!

[eldavojohn]

In Florida? Are you serious? Does anyone else realize that unless there's a hurricane Florida (especially central Florida) is basically a dead zone for winds [anl.gov]. That's not to say a freak wind storm couldn't occur but I've lived in some pretty windy places and never heard of a fire started by buffeting winds. Lightning, yes. I've googled for it, can someone point me to evidence of this phenomena actually happening? Having tried to get a spark or start fire by rubbing two sticks together, I can tell you that it would indeed by a freak occurrence if wind did just that.

Re:

[SJHillman]

My best guess is that it would be a localized wind pattern caused by a hill, valley, etc or even buildings if its anywhere near a city. it doesn't take much. Combine it with exceptionally dry air and it wouldn't take much for static electricity to start arcing. If there's any source of flammable gases such as hydrogen or methane beign stuck in the tree, it would take that much less of a spark to ignite.

However, I'm still betting on lighting or a stray cigarette.

Re:

[Anne_Nonymous]

>> hydrogen or methane beign stuck in the tree

So you're saying flatulent possums are responsible then?

Re:

[LastGunslinger]

Not saying this couldn't happen, but central Florida is flat and humid and the closest tall buildings to that park are in Orlando, many miles away.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

It's so improbable. Such a freak occurrence might only happen once every three and a half thousand years...

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

I live within 30 minutes of the tree, and we hadn't had any type of lightning for well over a month or two. The whole thing comes off as a bid odd here..

Re:

[rubycodez]

I blame you Tea Party haters

Re:

[trout007]

What you linked to is a power map. We get wind all the time here but it is only as fronts go across the state. You wouldn't want to put a wind turbine here but we gets strong winds quite frequently.

Re:

[Inda]

I wondered the same.

They can normally tell if a fire was started by an arsonist by finding accelerant residue, such as petrol.

Re:Got that right!

[batquux]

I think it was the light from Venus that was focused through a lens of marsh gas that started the fire.

Something really old died in Florida?

[rbrander]

Wow. I wonder if that ever happened before.

I'll miss you Treebeard

[StoutFiles]

You decided I wasn't an orc. I'll never forget you.

Greenpeace explaination: Not natural causes

[Nidi62]

This tree clearly self-immolated to protest deforestation and global warming. Maybe this will start a general protest among the trees and instead of an Arab Spring we will have an Arbor Spring.

Fire Prevention

[Oswald McWeany]

If only Florida had imported elephants to prevent wild fires this tree would still be alive today.

Re:

[Sentrion]

I think you meant rhinoceros, not elephant, to prevent wild fires.

Re:

[Oswald McWeany]

Good point- although I was actually referencing an earlier story where Australia was talking about importing Elephants to eat an invasive grass responsible for wild fires. [slashdot.org]

half-life of an immortal human is 400 years

[peter303]

15% of us die of accidents, violence or suicide in our 80 year lifespans. Eliminating all natural causes of death would only extend our lives so much, unless we practiced a culture of extreme safety. (This has been the theme of many scifi stories about immortals.)
Some trees may essentially immortal, but suffer from weather or animal trauma etc. Almost nothing is alive older than 10K years.

It's the drought

[FridayBob]

Florida is supposed to be subtropical with a relatively wet climate, but at the moment the place seems bone dry. Many wetlands have simply dried up and people fear that even most 'gator holes will not be deep enough for the reptiles to survive any significant frosts (the poor critters look pretty skinny as it is). Therefore, I guess it's not totally surprising that parts of the forest seem to be going up in flames spontaneously. When I lived there as a kid in the 60s and 70s, drought was never an issue, but now it has been for more than the past decade. To me, this is yet another strong sign that, climatologically, we live in a changing world.

Weeks Old Story, I mean Weeks old

[realsilly]

This story happened weeks ago, and originally it was suspected as arson, and that it was in too dense of an area for Firefighters to reach. Here is a link to the NPR story.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/01/17/145342304/one-of-worlds-oldest-cypress-trees-the-senator-burns-in-florida [npr.org].

This happened in mid-January. "On Monday (Jan. 16, 2012) Seminole County firefighter Al Caballero applied water to the smoldering base of The Senator. "

Re:

[Chrisq]

This story happened weeks ago, and originally it was suspected as arson, and that it was in too dense of an area for Firefighters to reach. Here is a link to the NPR story.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2012/01/17/145342304/one-of-worlds-oldest-cypress-trees-the-senator-burns-in-florida [npr.org].

This happened in mid-January. "On Monday (Jan. 16, 2012) Seminole County firefighter Al Caballero applied water to the smoldering base of The Senator. "

What is two weeks to a 3,500 ear old tree?

New York City Tree

[PPH]

It just spent winters in Florida.

The Perfect Crime!

[Greyfox]

Was it natural causes or was it... MURDER?! Certainly no one would SUSPECT the other trees in the area! But they all just STOOD there!

No photo?

[MaWeiTao]

I like how the damn article refers to this tree being majestic but then doesn't even feature a photo of the tree. Instead they present the reader with three useless photos.

In this day and age it's inexcusable for a news site to not feature big, quality photos. It took me all of 5 seconds to do a search online and find a good photo of the tree. You mean to tell me the so-called journalist who wrote this article couldn't have done the same? And then get some intern to get in touch with the rights-holder for permission to run it?

maybe Monday but not this Monday

[frovingslosh]

Mother Nature claimed one of her oldest living specimens (Monday) in a freak ...

I saw this on the news weeks ago. The article itself is dated Tuesday, January 17, 2012 (Last Monday Was January 30th). Shouldn't someone catch this stuff before it is published?

Re:Sigh

[sideslash]

Actually, there's a good answer for that: One of the really fulfilling and profounding affirming activities for nerds to engage in on a tech / "news for nerds" site is to complain about articles that don't fit that profile. But the problem is that if there never were any irrelevant articles, nobody would have anything to complain about, and thus we would have a compromised experience. It's paradoxical, but everything seems to be going according to plan.

Re:

[sideslash]

Er, "profounding" --> "profoundly"

Re:

[somersault]

You need to leave something to profounding fulfil the Grammar Nazis, dude.

Re:Sigh

[penguinchris]

(anyone here know off-hand where the other 4 older trees are?)

This is Slashdot, so I don't expect anyone here to know this, but TFA helpfully provides information about the other oldest trees :)

Re:Sigh

[Anrego]

Wow.

I read the article, and totally missed that. Kind of an interesting example of conditioning. As soon as I saw the blue email link after the conclusive paragraph, my brain basically said "ok, article is over" and stopped reading. My brain probably assumed the rest of the text was the usual "other thigns you may be interested in" cruft you tend to find.

global warming!

[Thud457]

wow, that's not carbon-neutral...

Re:Sigh

[smitty777]

There is an interesting article on the oldest trees in the world in this article [planetoddity.com]. It also has a good picture of The Senator before the fire.

Re:Sigh

[Phat_Tony]

People interested by that may also be interested to know the demise of the former oldest living thing in the world, the Prometheus Tree [wikipedia.org], which a graduate student cut down so he could count the rings.

Re:Sigh

[Mitchell314]

I figured this is science/biology related, and - I know, it seems impossible - but there is nerd stuff out there that isn't just IT stuff.

Re:Sigh

[Archimagus]

While I agree it maybe doesn't belong on Slashdot, I actually live about 5 minutes from the park where this tree was and would take my kids there to see this tree. Pretty magnificent. So, I at least find it cool to see it on /. even if it doesn't "really" belong here. Also, disappointed to see it go. I don't know if my kids were old enough to really remember seeing it from the last time we went there. I had been meaning to get back there, but, you know, who expect a 3500 year old tree to be suddenly gone. Also, they now suspect arson and not natural causes as originally thought.

Re:

[mark-t]

You live 5 minutes from the park and you don't know if your kids were old enough to remember seeing it from the last time you went there?

How is this even possible? Did they, like, never go outside or something?

Re:Sigh

[Anrego]

I saw lots of amazing perspective shifting stuff while getting dragged around on vacation by my parents as a kid .. and I don't remember most of it. At a certain age, stuff like this means nothing to most people.

Kinda like how stuff that put me to sleep in school has turned into a serious interest many years later. Sounds really stupid, but it was actually a jaw dropping realization that I could actually go to a museum on my own accord.. no bus or permission slips or anything required..

I think that's what was meant.

Re:

[mark-t]

Yeah... but this tree only burned down a couple of weeks ago.

Re:

[Archimagus]

A legitimate question. With a reasonable answer. While I live really close to this park, there are several in the area. As a playground there are other parks in the area that my kids prefer and so we go there more often. It's been maybe 2 years since we have been to that park. My oldest is now almost 9, so I'm sure he remembers going there, but I don't know if he really remembers the tree. My daughter just turned 5. I'm sure she doesn't remember going there.

Re:

[squidflakes]

I remember going on a school field trip to see this tree. There was a lot of grumbling and horsing around by most of the other kids, but the tree fascinated me.

Also, it gave me the chance to piss off one of my extremely religious teachers when I said "Wow, that thing is so old, it was around when they created the Jesus mythos!"

Re:Sigh

[SJHillman]

"(anyone here know off-hand where the other 4 older trees are?)"

Methuselah, believed to be about 4,800 years old. It's a species of pine tree somewhere in California. The exact location is kept a secret. This is believed to be the oldest tree still alive.
Most of the other oldest trees still living are giant sequoia scattered around California. I think Canada, Australia and Chile also have a few trees that were centuries old when Greek democracy was new.

Re:Sigh

[Anrego]

(tree) NERD!!!

Sorry, couldn't resist!

Also, someone just pointed out to me that they article actually lists the other 4 trees.. cleverly disguised as "further reading" cruft after the authors email. The thing about the one in California being kept secret is kinda neat though (and not mentioned in the article)! Canada isn't mentioned, but I've seen some _huge_ trees in BC .. wouldn't surprise me if one of them was comparable.

Re:Sigh

[jc42]

Methuselah, believed to be about 4,800 years old. It's a species of pine tree somewhere in California. The exact location is kept a secret. This is believed to be the oldest tree still alive.

Methuselah is a bristlecone pine. And there's a pretty good reason for the secrecy. The article mentions the fear of vandalism. But in the case of the bristlecones, something worse happened. In 1964, there was another one nicknamed Prometheus that was believed to be the oldest tree. The US Forest Service sent a guy in with a chainsaw to cut it down so they could verify its age. It turned out to be over 4900 years old. No older bristlecones have been found. Other forestry people were sufficiently outraged by this that it turned into a standard textbook-level warning, and people who study the oldest bristlecones refuse to report their locations, to protect them from the Forest Service as well as from common vandals.

Actually, there are a number of plants that aren't trees that are known to be older, but their living parts are all young. The textbook example is the creosote bush, which sends up offshoots around its edges, and then the central parts die off. This produces "creosote rings" that spread out across the landscape. A few have been found whose oldest remnants are dated to over 11,000 years. But the living parts are only a few centuries old.

The question "What's the oldest living thing?" turns out to be trickier to answer than you might expect. There are more than one way to define a "living thing", and there are several ways to measure age.

Re:Sigh

[strength_of_10_men]

There's a Radiolab episode that covers the story of Prometheus being cut down. Sad story.

http://www.radiolab.org/2010/jun/28/ [radiolab.org]

Re:Sigh

[cyberchondriac]

In 1964, there was another one nicknamed Prometheus that was believed to be the oldest tree. The US Forest Service sent a guy in with a chainsaw to cut it down so they could verify its age. It turned out to be over 4900 years old. No older bristlecones have been found. Other forestry people were sufficiently outraged by this that it turned into a standard textbook-level warning, and people who study the oldest bristlecones refuse to report their locations, to protect them from the Forest Service as well as from common vandals.

I know it's "just" a tree, and I'm not one to go cavorting about with greenpeace and whatnot, but wtf? What kind of stupidity is that- I can't believe they did that. The thing was close to 5,000 years old and they just killed it out of curiosity?
Anything that lasts that long deserves some respect.

Re:

[SJHillman]

It's very hard to determine the exact age of a tree that old, especially while its still alive.

There's also debate about what constitutes a tree. For example, Pando is a clonal colony of quaking aspen. While the individual trees (or stems if you want to get into the biology) may only live for a century or so, the colony itself is estimated around 80,000 years old. Clonal colonies like this could be considered biologically immortal.

Re:

[SJHillman]

And if my first post wasn't enough proof I spend too much time on Wikipedia, this previous post should be proof plenty.

Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_long-living_organisms [wikipedia.org] for more

Re:

[Smivs]

Why shouldn't it be on /. ? This is a 'nerdy' item, and a rather sad one as well. Rather this than the endless, tedious and (to me and many others) redundant posts relating to US politics.

Re:

[Sulphur]

Why shouldn't it be on /. ?
This is a 'nerdy' item, and a rather sad one as well. Rather this than the endless, tedious and (to me and many others) redundant posts relating to US politics.

We need fair and ballanced reporting.

Re:

[yurtinus]

Obviously we need a post about the state of the youngest trees in the world so we can get their view on this important issue.

Re:

[Sulphur]

Obviously we need a post about the state of the youngest trees in the world so we can get their view on this important issue.

Now that we have that, we can get on to the politics of other countries which are under-reported.

Re:

[gsgriffin]

Ditto

hey idiot.

[unity100]

a 3500 year old tree is a major scientific item. a more exciting tree would be a 4500 year old tree. or a 5500 year old tree. there's one in some american desert.

Re:

[yurtinus]

4600 something, a Bristlecone Pine in the White Mountains in California.

Re:

[tompaulco]

The hell is this doing on Slashdot? Selling advertising, just like all the other articles.

Re:

[wjcofkc]

While there have certainly been a couple "WTF is this doing on Slashdot" stories over the past couple weeks, I would say this falls in well with nerd news. If a 3,500 year old tree had been discovered an article would rightfully make it's way here. 3,500 year old tree burns down deserves the same. It is scientifically interesting. I also find it ironic that your post is really just flamebait.

Re:Sigh

[mcgrew]

Ok, I'm not normally one of the guy's who says this... but

Guy's what? Guy's sockpuppet? And which guy?

Slashdot isn't a tech site, it's a nerd site. The environmental and bioligical sciences are as interesting to us nerds as astronomy, physics, chemistry, any of the other sciences, OR technology.

What is there to discuss here?

If you hadn't tried so hard to make first post you would have been able to see for yourself.

Re:

[ChrisMaple]

Mentioned near the bottom of the article's page is a group of 8000 year old trees discovered in Sweden in 2008. This makes them well older than the religious nutcase claim that the universe is about 6000 years old. Thus the article is well within Slashdot's flamebait threshhold, and belongs here.

Re:

[yurtinus]

Those trees are clones of the same ancient root system. For a fascinating read, look up the wiki article on the Pando clonal colony of quaking aspens - they've estimated the root system to be 80,000 years old and covers 106 acres!

'Course, better to not rile up the nutcases on the age of these things. If somebody really wants to believe in something, you won't change their mind with mere factual observations...

Re:

[DarkOx]

Its "news for nerds" transportation strikes happen all the time, unless there is something really unusual about yours in Halifax, its not news for nerds and outside of Halifax were people might be effected its not even news.

A tree catching fire would not be news either except this one is among the oldest in the world! That makes it pretty unusual and therefore news worthy. So it meets the news part of the criteria. Lets see how it does on the nerd part!

Well nerds/geeks are curious about the world around t

Re:

[yurtinus]

Not only that, but a smoldering weeks-old lightning strike or heat from friction by the wind! A fascinating 3500 year old tree is destroyed in a fascinating way. My nerd juices are certainly flowing...

Re:

[jomama717]

I have never understood these complaints. If a story generates a lot of comments and discussion, then whether or not you or some other people feel that it "belongs" on slashdot is irrelevant - it has been found interesting by enough people in the slashdot community to warrant further discussion. Stories about some really niche piece of technology that you would probably say are the heart and soul of slashdot are the ones that generate ~30 comments and quickly fade into oblivion. Interestingly you can usu

Re:

[Kozar_The_Malignant]

Some of us science geek/nerd types are actually biology/botany nerds. This is definitely in the "stuff that matters" category for us. Computers exist to do plant synecology simulations and model plant community migrations in geologic time.

It is climatology related

[Openstandards.net]

Now that the tree is dead, the question becomes, will there be anything left we can use to study its rings to build our scientific knowledge of changes in the past 3500 years. Unfortunately, the story itself does not cover this angle.

http://www.priweb.org/globalchange/climatechange/studyingcc/scc_01.html [priweb.org]

Re:

[Ziwcam]

In addition, it's old news. Wikipedia says the fire happened two weeks ago http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Senator_(tree) [wikipedia.org]

Re:

[war4peace]

149 comments proving you wrong.
Just sayin'.

If YOU are not interested, it doesn't mean NOBODY is.

I'd consider the combustion start method(s) interesting from a technical perspective. I honestly wasn't aware that wind friction can set a tree on fire. OR that a week old lighting strike can do that as well.

Clarification please

[justthinkit]

Does BB mean this [internetslang.com] or this [musingsofamuse.com]? Google wasn't sure.
.

Whatever happened to using the full form, with the abbreviation in brackets before using the abbreviated form?

Re:Clarification please

[somersault]

I'm guessing he means BoingBoing [boingboing.net].

When I hear "boing boing" I just think "TITS!", but apparently it's a new aggregator..

Re:Clarification please

[ColdWetDog]

When I hear "boing boing" I just think "TITS!", but apparently it's a new aggregator..

The two concepts are not mutually exclusive. In fact ....

Re:

[Sulphur]

I think the real question is what is it doing on Slashdot again. I seem to remember this story coming up when it was first published almost a month ago.

This is the wake.

Re:

[Chrisq]

Wow this tree is old enough to be the forbidden fruit tree from the Garden of Eden! Maybe if we took a core sample we would find a heart saying "Adam + Eve" :)

Shhh .. you're encouraging heretical questions like "how did it survive the flood?"

Re:

[rubycodez]

it was on the Ark as a potted plant, duh! You unbelievers always use the most contrived scenarios instead of common sense.