Humans are killing off one of the world’s largest living things
One of the world’s largest and oldest living things is slowly dying, experts have warned – and people are to blame.
Pando, in the US state of Utah, is a forest of 47,000 genetically identical cloned trees sharing the same root system.
The trees in total weigh 5.8 million kilograms and is thought to have been there for 80,000 years.
However, it’s now failing to regenerate, and it’s growing too slowly to survive.
Paul Rogers of the Western Aspen Alliance and Utah State University told Gizmodo, people are at the “centre of that failure”.
Mr Rogers added over the past 30 or 40 years, grazing animals have chewed away at the Pando clone – and human failure to protect the trees through proper fencing is to blame.
“After significant investment in protecting the iconic Pando clone, we were disappointed in this result,” he said.
“In particular, mule deer appear to be finding ways to enter through weak points in the fence or by jumping over the eight-foot barrier.”
Mr Rogers said the forest is “now collapsing on our watch”.
“One clear lesson emerges here: we cannot independently manage wildlife and forests,” he said.
