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Mildly Interesting @lemmy.world

Quilotoa @lemmy.ca

3d ago

Sequoia stump in California, U.S.A.

I was looking through some old vacation pictures and came across this one. It sure gives a perspective on how big these trees are.

49 comments

It's cool because we killed the tree.

It was a better display alive where it was than in any museum.

I love chopping down trees, unironically. It is super satisfying, feels ooga booga good.
I don't think I could ever cut down a tree like that. It would just feel so fucking wrong. It's a goddamn miracle it's beautiful holy shit it's so big.
Sigh
- Yeah, you stand next to one of those things and you understand animism.

This isn't mildly interesting or even mildly sad, it's a lot sad 🌳😭

Fun fact, General Sherman (the biggest tree on earth by volume) is officially measured in baths. This is an actual sign at the ~~state~~ national park
- Come on… American units are entirely absurd but this sign clearly displays both cubic feet and cubic meters.
  These numbers are difficult to conceptualize so they’re accompanied by number of baths for context. Nothing official about baths.
  
  Ok, yes pedantically. “An official sign posted at the General Sherman Tree measures the tree in baths. The sign was made by national park officials, posted by national park officials, and is maintained by the official national park service. Though the national park office made this measurement and posted it, it is not an official measurement of said tree. That should only be done in cubic feet and/or meters.”
  I’ve since fixed my comment specifically for your enjoyment
  Edit: forgot Sequoia was a national park. Different office, still official
  
  reposted to /anythingbutmetric
- Americans will use anything except the metric system
- I remember that tree. The sign wasn't so pretty back when I went.

Super cool picture, but it's absolutely disgusting that all those awesome, ancient trees were clear cut :(
- This is the Mark Twain stump in Kings Canyon National Park. In 1891 they fell this tree to display it at the Museum of Natural History. So not too sure if clear cutting occurred, but the stump is 16 feet wide either way!
  
  I wonder how wide the stump is...

This is such a sad picture. Imagine the life that tree could have facilitated and harbored over its lifetime. We should all be replanting natives as fast as we possibly can.
- The cool part about humanity is we could do it again. We made the Amazon rainforest by abandoning millions of acres of farmland and letting it grow over into a rainforest. We didn't do it on purpose, but now that we understand what happened, we totally could. All it requires is multigenerational discipline. So it might as well be a dream lmao
  
  Go back over the part where "We made the amazon rainforest" for me?
  
  Wait, did I miss something? When was the Amazon rainforest ever farmland during the lifetime of humanity?

God... I hope they build the 8th wonder of the world, or the biggest homeless shelter, or a palace orphanage with this tree. Please don't tell me, it is some stupid statue or a salon furniture ensemble with this...
- Even worse. Many of our ancient forests were cut into boards for personal profit.
  
  Worse still, half of the wood from these trees was rendered unusable when the massive trees hit the ground
  
  boards for personal profit
  So they turned it into shelves??! (O_0)

Sequoiadendron is the giant redwood, coastal redwood is the tallest, it's unique in that it's a hexaploid which rare for a gymnosperm, except ephedra plants. Scientist speculated it's because it evolved from its self(cloning behaviour) although it's capable of outcrossing too. The final genus is the metaseaquoia, the Chinese dawn redwood
- Scientist speculated it's because it evolved from its self(cloning behaviour)
  So it is an abomination of some sort?
  
  apparently plants like to vegatively reproduce, redwood especially, one of the reason it has duplicates(6 copies of its genome) is during meisosis, during gamtes are "unreduced" so they dont form like half like normal, they just keep the duplicated genome(most conifers are diploids). its not a problem for plants when they do this, but its less common in animals.

That is so freakin' cool! The size of that plant is on display in its stumpy remains...just revel in thoughts of its original girth and height!
Ugh...imagining it's majesty by extrapolation makes me sad at what I see that is no longer there. That makes me sad.

The Mark Twain Stump https://www.nps.gov/places/000/big-stump.htm
- Oh, cool. Thanks. I imagine it took some manipulation to fell it and move it.
  
  I've not been there enough, somehow missed this completely. Have to go back. Having grown up in California, in the redwoods, I understand the scale of these things but this photo doesn't even look real. It's nuts. So, I learned something. Thanks for posting.

When the pioneers and settlers came upon those giants they must have thought they had wandered into another world.

were

Took me a second to realize that was a person lying down and not bits of mushroom
- My wife.
  
  "I too choose this dead tree's wife"

Not a very flattering picture of Ms. Stump, but ok.

49 comments