Prehistoric Trees and Fossils

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.

"Earth's earliest forest" was found in 2023 - a 390m year old "fossil forest" of Cladoxylopsida related to ferns and Sphenopsida (horsetails) looking like modern-day ferns and standing 6½ 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.

Trees had already existed for 50 million years, including during the Carboniferous Period before conifers began to appear.

Britain was re-colonised by trees some 12,000 years ago, after the last Ice Age.

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.

A 377 million year old tree fossil has been found near Torbay in a protected global geopark, the oldest so far in Britain. The remains have been removed for scientific research due to being situated in rocks at base of cliffs and in danger of being washed away by incoming tides. The tree fossils looked a lot like Palm Trees but have no relationship to present Palms.

A fossilised forest has been discovered in the south west of England at some 390 million years old now regarded as the oldest worldwide, surpassing the 386 million years old one found in New York State.

A 42,000-year-old kauri tree preserved in a New Zealand bog contains 1,700 years of growth rings, providing valuable insights into the Laschamp event, a brief reversal and weakening of Earth’s magnetic field 42,000 years ago. Spanning 1,700 years, the rings of the tree offer a detailed record of environmental conditions during the magnetic field's collapse, creating a unique opportunity to study the relationship between geomagnetic reversals and environmental shifts, so that we can improve our understanding of Earth's climatic history.

For millions of years, Ginkgo thrived across Laurasia, the northern supercontinent. In the Cretaceous-Paleogene Extinction Event approximately 66 million years ago, most of the flora and fauna of the Dinosaur Age were wiped out. However, Ginkgo persevered and gradually reduced in population over following millenia. ​​By the end of the Pleistocene Epoch (Ice Age) Ginkgo was reduced to isolated populations in China. They almost became extinct, but their natural resilience to the elements helped them to survive.

Carbon impressions of Ginkgo leaves have been found in fossilised rocks from the Permian Period (290–248 million years ago). Some of the best fossils are from the Jurassic Strata of North Yorkshire.

Like Ginkgo, the Dragon Tree (Dracaena draco) can be considered a 'living fossil' due to being a Tertiary relict species – from one of the oldest ecosystems in the world!