The oldest tree in Europe is found in Italy

OLDEST TREE IN EUROPE

It is a Bosnian pine (in English it is literally called Bosnian pine) of well , grew up among the Basilicata , Calabria, the'oldest tree in Europe. The old man, baptized Italy, has been dated and recognized by a team of Italian excellences: researchers led by Professor Gianluca Piovesan ofUniversity of TusciaThe surprising discovery has attracted the attention of the world's specialist press as it is the first time that the scientific method to accurately date such an ancient tree. But not only that: the beautiful and imposing Pine had shown signs of continued growth in recent decades, despite the climate changes and the heat waves that have led to the death of many hectares of deciduous forest.

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THE OLDEST PINE TREE IN EUROPE

Situated on the peak of a rocky slope in the mountains of Pollino National Park, for the professor Piovesan and his team was very difficult to assign to Italy his real age: to date a tree usually we proceed by detecting the rings in the central part of the trunk. In this case, however, the tree trunk, in the center, was completely pulverized inside it, making it impossible to use the traditional method to date the pine.

So using a technique based on the radiocarbon, exactly as is done in the case of fossil findings, the team of researchers took samples of Wood from pine roots and analyzed them by combining them with the dendrochronology, managing to trace theexact age oftree.

Il Bosnian pine more long-lived of Europe, together with other specimens millennials of the same park, would have been able to live for centuries despite the climate absolutely not favorable and it exploitation of nature surrounding area by the hand of man, in an area where a strong population density.

According to the researchers' study, the ancient pine would be sprouted in a particularly cold phase of the Middle Ages and would then have grown over the course of much warmer years, even continuing to grow in recent decades, those in which the effects of the climate change.

Leaving aside for a moment the use of a scientific dating method for the first time on a tree, the discovery is particularly relevant and important because it allows us to begin to trace a model of forest behaviour in front of the global warming. It seems indeed that Italy survived also thanks to the measures against thepollution ratified in recent years, and it is a first working hypothesis which scholars can use as a guideecosystem forest in the near future. Meanwhile, the long-lived pine tree is doing well: centuries-old pines and sequoias, like those found in America, die only because of strong external traumas or pathogenic agents, but in the absence of these conditions they can be said to be alive even if only a small part of them is alive. Italy will still have the privilege of being able to say tree older thanEurope: before him only a pine tree in the Northern Greece old man of .

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