Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know from how Stuff Works
Speaker 1: dot Com. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark,
Speaker 1: and there's Charles W. Chuck, Brian over there, and there's
Speaker 1: Jerry and this is Stuff you Should Know. This is
Speaker 1: a current contemporary edition. Chuck, Oh, yeah it is. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're talking about Pando and Pando's kind of made the
Speaker 1: rounds of the news lately, current contemporary edition of a
Speaker 1: topic that could be tens of thousands of years old. Yes,
Speaker 1: that's right. Yeah, that's well. Put Actually, did you know
Speaker 1: about Pando? Yeah, you saw the news lately. No, I
Speaker 1: just previously knew about Pando. Oh. Really, that's kind of
Speaker 1: awesome because I knew about the giant mushroom out in Oregon.
Speaker 1: Um it, I didn't know about Pando, and now I do,
Speaker 1: and we'll get to it. But Panda's Panda is not
Speaker 1: doing so hot right now. Spoiler. Yeah, that is a spoiler,
Speaker 1: isn't it. It's a sad giant forest. It is a
Speaker 1: genetically identical forest. So let's let's spell it out for
Speaker 1: But what Pando is you want to Yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: it's an aspen forest aspen trees, which, by the way,
Speaker 1: far and away the best trees, best looking trees at least. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's certainly one of them, depending on what you're out for.
Speaker 1: Uh in your as your tree fetish, well, I tend
Speaker 1: to like the white papery bark with um black eyes.
Speaker 1: That's usually the kind of tree I like. So aspens
Speaker 1: it for me. Yeah, So I mean aspens in general,
Speaker 1: before we get to what Panda is. They are their
Speaker 1: medium sized. Uh, they're deciduous. They're generally between twenty and
Speaker 1: eighty feet high, about three to eighteen inches in diameter.
Speaker 1: And like you said, they have that bark that's that
Speaker 1: sort of smooth greenish white, yellowish white gray or white.
Speaker 1: And uh, they have a little green in the bark,
Speaker 1: but from chlorophyll, which is kind of interesting for a tree. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's um from what I saw unique among North American
Speaker 1: trees that that um aspen bark actually is living. It's
Speaker 1: like tissue that actually produces chlorophyll and carries out some
Speaker 1: of photosynthesis for the tree, and most other trees don't
Speaker 1: do that. But that explains why the bark is so
Speaker 1: unique too. Yeah. So the aspen is known for for
Speaker 1: a lot of things, but one of the things where
Speaker 1: their leaves produced. They're they're really thin and firm, almost round,
Speaker 1: about an inch and a half to three inches in diameter,
Speaker 1: with a little you know, pointy apex. They look kind
Speaker 1: of like a spade in a suit of cards deck
Speaker 1: of cards. Yeah, sort of like that. For sure, call
Speaker 1: a spade a spade unless it's an aspen leaf. But
Speaker 1: the sound that they make is really unique. If you're
Speaker 1: in the forest, in a grove of aspen and the
Speaker 1: wind kicks up, it's a really unique and i say,
Speaker 1: very very calming experience because the stems are flat instead
Speaker 1: of round and perpendicular to the flatness of the leaf. Wow,
Speaker 1: that was a really great description. So the the leaf
Speaker 1: kind of moves around, and then the stem in ways
Speaker 1: that leaves typically don't, they kind of trembles in the wind. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's like a fluttery butterfly wing almost. And then because
Speaker 1: the leaves are sparse enough, you wouldn't just look at
Speaker 1: and be like, look at how sparse that tree is.
Speaker 1: But compared to some other trees, say like a maple
Speaker 1: or an oak or something, the space in between leaves
Speaker 1: is greater, and so that allows the sunlight to kind
Speaker 1: of come in through the canopy of the aspen, and
Speaker 1: when the wind blows and it gets all of those
Speaker 1: leaves going, that has an effect on the sunlight too. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So that sound though, is uh specifically Pando is a
Speaker 1: quaking aspen. Uh. It just the sound that it creates
Speaker 1: is very very unique. It's not even just like a
Speaker 1: regular calming of the wind through the trees. It's more
Speaker 1: like a quack quack. That's a pretty good aspen quaking
Speaker 1: aspen impression. It sounds like a duck. No, that's a
Speaker 1: lot of people confuse it for ducks, So it's it's
Speaker 1: actually a pretty good aspen. So that's the aspen in general.
Speaker 1: But go ahead and drop it, drop it on everyone's
Speaker 1: head what Panda is, because it's pretty remarkable. Are you're
Speaker 1: letting me do it? Yeah? All right, So Pando is
Speaker 1: an aspen forest, an enormous aspen force, a hundred and
Speaker 1: six acre aspen force. And you'd say, well, I could
Speaker 1: name the woods in my backyard Todd or Jimmy, who
Speaker 1: cares somebody gave a name to a forest. But no,
Speaker 1: there's something very special about Pando. Pando is not just
Speaker 1: a force. Pando is a forest of trees that are
Speaker 1: all genetically identical because they all come from one massive
Speaker 1: roots structure that forms by mass, the largest organism on Earth. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's pando thirteen million pounds uh tons. And uh. While
Speaker 1: we would love to say every single one of these,
Speaker 1: maybe up to fifty thou trees is connected literally, some
Speaker 1: of them might not be. But we did learn through
Speaker 1: this research that you can be uh cut off if something,
Speaker 1: you know, happens to cut you off from your from
Speaker 1: the roots of your neighbor, you can still be considered
Speaker 1: part of that because you're still genetically identical, right, yes,
Speaker 1: and so um Quaking aspens are kind of unique at
Speaker 1: least as far as trees go, but not necessarily as
Speaker 1: far as plants go, and that they reproduce through something
Speaker 1: called vegetative reproduction. And it's pretty straightforward stuff. If you've
Speaker 1: ever seen, like saying, augustine grass or a strawberry or
Speaker 1: something like that. It just sends out like a stem
Speaker 1: or something like that, and then the stem, once it
Speaker 1: gets to certain points, starts to shoot down roots and
Speaker 1: then it starts to grow like another section of the plant.
Speaker 1: But it's still kind of like a new plant growing
Speaker 1: out of the original plant's arm. It's all the same plan.
Speaker 1: It's one big organism. Um. And that's how Pando has
Speaker 1: spread through this vegetative reproduction. Yeah. And this can happen underground,
Speaker 1: like in the case of Pando, it's not like you
Speaker 1: see this, uh, like horizontal fence of tree branches all
Speaker 1: along the ground. It's actually roots underground. Sometimes it can
Speaker 1: go like a hundred feet and say, I think I'd
Speaker 1: like to grow up now, Yeah, it feels like a
Speaker 1: good spot. Why don't you grow up? And the little
Speaker 1: sprout called the ramit says, I will watch, and Pando
Speaker 1: goes whoa with the light. Yes, and it looks like
Speaker 1: its own tree. But uh, whether connected or not, it's
Speaker 1: usually connected. Um, it's it's the same tree. Right. So um,
Speaker 1: you said something that some of the trees in Pando
Speaker 1: might not actually be part of Pando. There's a couple
Speaker 1: of ways that can happen. Like you said. One, they
Speaker 1: could be cut off physically, but even still it's still
Speaker 1: considered part of the same group of trees, the same organism.
Speaker 1: And when you're talking about a like a stand of
Speaker 1: genetically identical aspen trees, they're called a clone, like a
Speaker 1: pack of them or stand of them. It's called a clone,
Speaker 1: so you can have physically cut off, genetically identical trees
Speaker 1: that are still considered part of the same clone. But
Speaker 1: being a tree, pando Um can also reproduce sexually. And
Speaker 1: aspens are also kind of unique or peculiar in that
Speaker 1: they can reproduce vegetatively, but they also reproduce sexually, but
Speaker 1: they don't have the equipment for both sides of sexual
Speaker 1: reproduction on the same tree. So a tree is either
Speaker 1: male or female, and in the case of pando, Pando's
Speaker 1: a male. But that's pretty interesting too. I think if
Speaker 1: that we're talking about like the biggest organism on Earth,
Speaker 1: the most massive organism on Earth, but to know that
Speaker 1: it has a name and that it's a male just
Speaker 1: makes it all that more endearing, you know. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: like you said, even though they do have flowers and sexes,
Speaker 1: it's they almost always reproduce vegetatively. Yeah, I think it's
Speaker 1: starting to become clear that they actually produce sexually more
Speaker 1: than we realize. But for a long time they're like,
Speaker 1: that's basically it for aspen. Yeah, and it's uh, like
Speaker 1: there are plenty of aspen grows and clones that are impressive,
Speaker 1: but this is one where every thing kind of came together,
Speaker 1: and we'll talk about all those different things, but everything
Speaker 1: kind of came together in the right way just to
Speaker 1: create something this massive, Right, Yeah, Panda lucked out. In
Speaker 1: other words, yeah, they're not normally this impressive and large.
Speaker 1: No huh um. One of the things about like a
Speaker 1: clone of aspen trees like Pando is that in one
Speaker 1: of the reasons why they can get so huge is
Speaker 1: one that vegetative growth, of vegetative reproduction. But also when
Speaker 1: you have, like when you're covering a hundred and six
Speaker 1: acres of land, you've got a like a lot of
Speaker 1: different resources available to you, and you're interconnected, you're just
Speaker 1: one organism. And this whole thing makes me think, like, Chuck,
Speaker 1: what are we really talking about when we're talking about pando.
Speaker 1: We're talking about the collection of individual trees that we
Speaker 1: typically see as like as individuals. Are we really talking
Speaker 1: about like the roots system? Is that the real organism
Speaker 1: that we're referring to? Are you asking a little bit?
Speaker 1: I think it's both. It's all the same, right, Okay,
Speaker 1: I guess it is all the same, but but you
Speaker 1: tend to think of like an organism is like, you know,
Speaker 1: a tree is a thing, but a whole bunch of
Speaker 1: trees that are all connected to a root system that's
Speaker 1: just different in some weird way that I can't quite
Speaker 1: put my finger on. Yeah. I like to think that
Speaker 1: they're all just holding hands underground, right, but it's all
Speaker 1: just one hand. Yeah. But like you were saying, uh,
Speaker 1: like the benefits of something like this is that they
Speaker 1: are they do have different access to different things depending
Speaker 1: on where they are in that forest. So like there
Speaker 1: may be you know, three or four big old trees
Speaker 1: down near the water that are just sucking up water
Speaker 1: and sharing it with the trees near them. They can
Speaker 1: just send that right down the old shared root pipeline
Speaker 1: and say, I know you're thirsty over there, so why
Speaker 1: don't you enjoy this spring water? Yeah, exactly, it's delicious
Speaker 1: spring water. Um. They can also shuttle newt treents around
Speaker 1: pando Can from one area to another, and so as
Speaker 1: a result, you'll find aspens in some like really surprising places.
Speaker 1: They're really hearty, and they really they show up everywhere
Speaker 1: from like kind of wet rainforesty type areas to semi
Speaker 1: arid um kind of brush land, Like they'll grow everywhere.
Speaker 1: And they have a huge range too. You can find
Speaker 1: aspen in North America from Alaska down to Mexico and
Speaker 1: from Vancouver over to Maine. So they have a pretty good,
Speaker 1: pretty good range. Uh, and they've grow just about everywhere. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but they need a lot of sunshine. The one thing
Speaker 1: that um, the aspen does not like a shade, and
Speaker 1: as their kryptonite it kind of is um. Moist soil
Speaker 1: is the best. Plenty of sunshine and uh, gravelly slopes,
Speaker 1: sandy sandy ground is great. But they are pretty um,
Speaker 1: pretty hardy as long as as long as you don't
Speaker 1: have anything big that's creating a canopy nearby to block
Speaker 1: out that sunshine. Yeah, because think about you've got some
Speaker 1: shoots that grew up and they're like, oh, I'm in
Speaker 1: a semi arid area, now i could use some water
Speaker 1: over here, and it just sends it from the wetlands.
Speaker 1: I just think that's amazing. Josh Love, Pando Chuck Love
Speaker 1: message break. Okay, let's do it then. All right, Well,
Speaker 1: now we're on the road, driving in your truck. Want
Speaker 1: to learn a thing or two from Josh Pan Chuck.
Speaker 1: It's stuff you should know, all right, than alright, Chuck,
Speaker 1: So we could probably stop here, and I just I'd
Speaker 1: stand by my statement about loving PANDO. I think PANDO
Speaker 1: is just an amazing inter seing organism. But I think
Speaker 1: like all aspen stands are now all clones of aspen
Speaker 1: let's think they're really cool. But we haven't even begun
Speaker 1: to scratch the surface and how interesting these things are. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you want to talk about fire, I do, because this
Speaker 1: is one of the reasons why I love earth science,
Speaker 1: Like everything fits together, and everything has an explanation, and
Speaker 1: if you mess with one thing over here, something else
Speaker 1: way over here goes weird. I just love earth science
Speaker 1: for that and this is a good example of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so in our forest fires episode, which I think was
Speaker 1: a great one, and go back and revisit that if
Speaker 1: you want to learn more about this kind of thing.
Speaker 1: But fire, as it happens, forest fires are kind of
Speaker 1: great for aspens. Yeah, they thrive in fire pretty much
Speaker 1: not in fire. It's a little little complicated, but it's
Speaker 1: actually very simple. So um, So there's a few things
Speaker 1: that happened like with fire. Supposedly, a wildfire when it
Speaker 1: reaches an aspen stand will will sometimes die out because
Speaker 1: aspens actually don't burn very well. They have really wet leaves,
Speaker 1: and their bark says pretty moist too, and so does
Speaker 1: their branches, So they don't burn well. Um, but they
Speaker 1: are sensitive to fire, and that they've kind of seems
Speaker 1: like kind of evolved to respond to fire, but not
Speaker 1: necessarily in the ways you think like they can burn,
Speaker 1: especially their canopy, their tops can burn pretty pretty badly.
Speaker 1: But the way that they react to fire is if
Speaker 1: fire comes through and wipes out some of their sprouts,
Speaker 1: those little ramlets, the seedlings basically that grow up from
Speaker 1: the roots system. If fire wipes some of those out,
Speaker 1: those things send like a hormonal signal to the rest
Speaker 1: of the tree saying we've got this area covered. We
Speaker 1: don't need any competition, just keep the sprouts in check here.
Speaker 1: When when those things are gone and those hormonal signals
Speaker 1: are lost to the tree responds by shooting up many,
Speaker 1: many times the number of sprout that were lost to
Speaker 1: fire and repopulates an area that's been ravaged by fire
Speaker 1: very very quickly and comes to dominate it for the
Speaker 1: next hundred, two hundred, possibly thousand years. Yeah, twenty or
Speaker 1: thirty years is all it takes. Uh, if an area
Speaker 1: has been wiped out by wildfire to get that aspen
Speaker 1: grove is plentiful or even more so than it was before. Uh.
Speaker 1: And they do this because, uh, well, the conifer is
Speaker 1: sort of the enemy. We like to think all trees
Speaker 1: like each other, and they probably do emotionally, but the
Speaker 1: conifer is what really provides that that upper canopy that
Speaker 1: that is really bad for the aspen. So during a wildfire,
Speaker 1: the aspen is fire resistant to a certain degree because,
Speaker 1: like you said, with the wetness of the leaves and
Speaker 1: twigs and branches. But those conifers go up like a match,
Speaker 1: so they're killed off first. A lot of times, like
Speaker 1: you said that, the aspens are just left and they're great.
Speaker 1: We we got rid of those jerky conifers over there,
Speaker 1: and now we're good. But even if it does kill
Speaker 1: it all out, the aspens grow up a lot faster
Speaker 1: than the new conifers do, so they basically sort of
Speaker 1: beat them to the punch post wildfire, right exactly. And
Speaker 1: not just wildfires. They show up after like mud slides
Speaker 1: and rock slides and landslides and avalanches and everything you
Speaker 1: can think of that could wipe out a forest. You're
Speaker 1: gonna if if it's within the aspens range, you're gonna
Speaker 1: find aspen there first. And you know, we were talking
Speaker 1: about how one of the things about it is that quaking,
Speaker 1: trembling sunlight that allows filter light through well. That obviously
Speaker 1: allows saplings of um aspen to shoot up and grow.
Speaker 1: And and as you were saying, when the conifers come in,
Speaker 1: they block out that sunlight, and so the aspen seedlings
Speaker 1: don't have any kind of chance at growing up as
Speaker 1: the conifers start to uh interlope through the borders. I
Speaker 1: think that right interloped through the borders of the clone,
Speaker 1: the aspen clone, and then eventually make their way further
Speaker 1: and further in. And then if everything's going well for
Speaker 1: the aspen, and as is the case with nature, fire
Speaker 1: comes along wipes all the conifers out and the cycle
Speaker 1: starts again. And through this an aspen clone can live
Speaker 1: for a very very long time as long as there's
Speaker 1: a cycle of fire that doesn't come too frequently and
Speaker 1: keep the aspen from growing back or come to infrequently
Speaker 1: and allow the conifers to really take over and kill
Speaker 1: off any new growth in the aspen clone. Yeah, if
Speaker 1: it wasn't for like if America, if North America had
Speaker 1: never had humans here and it was just allowed to
Speaker 1: do whatever happens, Uh, there would be a lot more fire.
Speaker 1: You know. Fire suppression is a is a human thing
Speaker 1: because we like to put out fires for the most part.
Speaker 1: And if that had never happened, the United States would
Speaker 1: have I don't want to say it would be largely aspen,
Speaker 1: but there would be a lot of aspen forest and
Speaker 1: forest grows, yeah, and the ones that are around still today,
Speaker 1: it would be in a lot better shape because I mean,
Speaker 1: just another way to put it is aspen grows need
Speaker 1: fire to thrive. Yeah, just as simple as that. It's
Speaker 1: really really interesting. So um, one of the things that
Speaker 1: I ran across I kept seeing was that a lot
Speaker 1: of the and I got the impression that was like
Speaker 1: old time or stuff. And I was right that you
Speaker 1: can you can tell one aspen grow from another, like
Speaker 1: a clone from another clone, because they'll grow up against
Speaker 1: each other and sometimes intermingle. Um. Sometimes in the spring
Speaker 1: you can see the leaf formation kind of come out
Speaker 1: in certain ways, but really in the fall you can see,
Speaker 1: you know, one aspen clone from another one will have
Speaker 1: like a like a brilliant gold other will be like
Speaker 1: a scarlet red or something like that. And then in
Speaker 1: the fall you can kind of see the boundaries between
Speaker 1: one aspen clone and another aspen clone. And for many
Speaker 1: of myn of years, that's just how they did it.
Speaker 1: And then genetics came along and they said, yeah, you're
Speaker 1: wrong about a lot of this. Yeah. So like the
Speaker 1: old timey researchers would say, look at those twenty five
Speaker 1: trees all grouped together. They have the same exact bright
Speaker 1: yellow color. Uh so that's that's all one clone. And
Speaker 1: these guys over here red. But like you said, when
Speaker 1: they actually finally got the technology to check, that was
Speaker 1: not necessarily the case, and they'd walk away like kind
Speaker 1: of dust in their hands off and fine, going off
Speaker 1: to the no after before they're like, it was a
Speaker 1: fine days work using my peepers to to tell one
Speaker 1: clone apart from another. Peepers. I know that word. I
Speaker 1: came across it again. You remember that episode. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that's one of the worst slang terms of
Speaker 1: all times. Peepers, one of the worst non offensive slang
Speaker 1: terms of all time. Yeah, that's a good that's a
Speaker 1: good call leaf peepers. Yeah, and that the whole thing
Speaker 1: the genetic zo is. For a while there that was
Speaker 1: causing a little bit of uh, well, I mean just confusion.
Speaker 1: I guess it's not. It wasn't like the end of
Speaker 1: the world or anything, but it was a little confusing
Speaker 1: because at one point, like you know, thirty years ago,
Speaker 1: they the scientists were there watching what they thought was
Speaker 1: that single clone of aspen, and they thought, oh my god,
Speaker 1: we've just learned something. This this this tree or this
Speaker 1: you know, this clone has actually changed sex. It's amazing.
Speaker 1: It's producing pollen this year and last year it produced flowers,
Speaker 1: and oh my god, what a breakthrough. And then now
Speaker 1: that we have genetic testing, they're like, oh no, that's
Speaker 1: actually two different clones. Yeah, when they started looking at
Speaker 1: at um some of those trees more closely, like, yeah,
Speaker 1: they look alike, but actually this is they're not genetically identical.
Speaker 1: They're not part of the same Aspen clone, but they
Speaker 1: could still be a direct descendant from that Aspen clone,
Speaker 1: because remember and aspens reproduced. They can do it one
Speaker 1: of two ways, vegetatively, which produces trees that are genetically
Speaker 1: identical to other trees that have sprouted up from the
Speaker 1: same root system, or they can do it sexually um,
Speaker 1: and the seeds that come out are um are not
Speaker 1: genetically identical, So you can have offspring and genetic genetically
Speaker 1: identical clones of the same tree all intermingled in the
Speaker 1: same little area. It's pretty fascinating, it is. Uh. And
Speaker 1: as far as age of these things, it kind of
Speaker 1: depends um on where you are. Like, usually an aspen
Speaker 1: tree won't live more than a hundred and fifty years,
Speaker 1: occasionally up to two hundred in in Colorado, where Panda is.
Speaker 1: I just love saying his name. I know, it's so cute.
Speaker 1: It's close to Panda, that's why. That's definitely why. But oh,
Speaker 1: it's nice of fat on the end, so it looks
Speaker 1: like it's got some chubby cheeks you just want to pinch.
Speaker 1: Probably does. As far as as Panda goes in Colorado,
Speaker 1: they usually don't get to be more than about seventy
Speaker 1: five years old. And it's not like you can go
Speaker 1: to a clone either and pluck out what you think
Speaker 1: is the oldest tree and say this is how old
Speaker 1: the clone is, because it may be oh yeah, it
Speaker 1: may be the newest tree. That's why I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: so is the organism really the root system if a tree,
Speaker 1: if a tree just like dies. I think around the
Speaker 1: area where Pando grows in Utah, uh, I think on
Speaker 1: the Colorado Front Range is what it's called. They said
Speaker 1: Colorado Emit Colorado Front Range, Colorado Front Range, so um,
Speaker 1: in that area they usually live that well we call trees,
Speaker 1: but what are really just stems growing up from Pando's
Speaker 1: root system. Those things live for about seventy five years.
Speaker 1: The oldest aspens live for about two hundred years. Pando
Speaker 1: is way way older than that, even by the most
Speaker 1: conservative estimates. Yeah, I mean they say thirteen thousand years
Speaker 1: old to eighty thousand years old. Yeah, and I think
Speaker 1: thirteen thousand is really hedging bets because they're like, well,
Speaker 1: that's about when the last ice age ended, so Pando
Speaker 1: probably couldn't have lived through that. But I was looking
Speaker 1: at ice sheet maps. There was not an ice sheet
Speaker 1: anywhere near where Panda's going. So it's it's entirely possible
Speaker 1: with a hardy and resilient as um aspen stands are
Speaker 1: that Pando is as far far older than that. You
Speaker 1: mean the ice sheet map on your bedroom wall. He
Speaker 1: just got out of bed, went let me look at
Speaker 1: this again. Well, you haven't been over for a while.
Speaker 1: I haven't pasted to the ceiling, so I don't even
Speaker 1: oh man, just lay there in point. I'm like, you're
Speaker 1: really getting efficiencies the laurentide kind of day. That's great. Yeah,
Speaker 1: uh yeah. So I mean and this one article sent
Speaker 1: over the said in principle, clones may even be essentially immortal.
Speaker 1: That's you know. But yeah, they've they hedged it within principle,
Speaker 1: like and it can die from disease like aspen or
Speaker 1: they're not like indestructible. There's all sorts of things that
Speaker 1: can hurt them. Because of their really soft bark, they're
Speaker 1: susceptible to boring insects and diseases that can come from
Speaker 1: that um. A lot of birds that bore live in
Speaker 1: in aspen um, which I think is not bad for him.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure, but there so they can die. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of things that can kill an aspen growth.
Speaker 1: But if if everything was going right, where there's no
Speaker 1: reason that it should die, there's no like a human,
Speaker 1: we can do everything right and we're still going to
Speaker 1: die someday. There's like a certain there's a certain number
Speaker 1: of times our cells are going to divide, and they're
Speaker 1: gonna stop, and we're eventually going to run out of
Speaker 1: dividing cells and then we die. Right, that's not necessarily
Speaker 1: the case with an Aspen clone. That's why they're saying,
Speaker 1: like in principle they are technically immortal, or they may
Speaker 1: be technically immortal, and they think that possibly Pando is
Speaker 1: more than eighty thousand years old. That's the high end.
Speaker 1: Although there's a and uh at the University of Michigan,
Speaker 1: who's who's saying something like a million. I'm not back
Speaker 1: in that one. I love that. I'll go as high
Speaker 1: as eighty thousand and uh. Dr Barnes, we don't mean
Speaker 1: to call you a kook. We're just joking. We were joking.
Speaker 1: All right. Well, let's uh take a break, hire an attorney,
Speaker 1: and we're going to talk about why why pandos now
Speaker 1: in trouble, which is very very sad. Right after this, well,
Speaker 1: now we're on the road, driving in your truck. Want
Speaker 1: to learn a thing or two from Josh Pam Chuck.
Speaker 1: It's stuff you should know, all right, all right, Chuck,
Speaker 1: Like you said, I spoiled it for everybody already. But
Speaker 1: Pando is dying. Yeah, Um, that's not an overstatement. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's very sad. Here's what's going on, and here's what
Speaker 1: can go on really to any I mean Pando special,
Speaker 1: but any any clone like Thisando is very special. It's uh.
Speaker 1: There are a few things that can happen. We already
Speaker 1: talked a little bit about, like you know, birds and
Speaker 1: and blight and stuff like that. There's also disease. Uh,
Speaker 1: but human interaction has had a major toll on these forests.
Speaker 1: In the eighties and nineties, there were, of course, people
Speaker 1: were able to build homes within where Pando is, in
Speaker 1: this hundred and six acres. Uh. People also want to
Speaker 1: go see these things that like, all right, well let's
Speaker 1: let's put a campground there as well. And if you
Speaker 1: want to campground, you want toilets, and you want plumbing,
Speaker 1: and you want picnic tables and roads, roads and parking
Speaker 1: lots and stuff like that and water lines and all
Speaker 1: of this stuff. Even though they do as good a
Speaker 1: job as they can at pres ovation, um, it all
Speaker 1: takes its toll little by little with every new you know,
Speaker 1: parking lot laid down on something like Pando. So um,
Speaker 1: all of these things being built in the middle of Pando, right,
Speaker 1: in the middle of Pando Um. They have had their effect.
Speaker 1: But it's probable that Panda is kind of like, let's
Speaker 1: just grow around you. It's fine. I'm not happy about it, human,
Speaker 1: but I know you don't know any better. I'm Pando.
Speaker 1: I'll just grow around. So that's fine. That's not what
Speaker 1: it is. That was. That's so that's strike one. But
Speaker 1: humans are not off the hook because it turns out
Speaker 1: that we're doing things in other ways and that whole
Speaker 1: like Earth science, messing with something over here has having
Speaker 1: these effects over here. That's going on with Pando right
Speaker 1: now as well. Yeah, because one of the major threats,
Speaker 1: aside from wildfires that we're putting out is uh. Herbivores,
Speaker 1: deer and elk specifically love to eat the those tiny
Speaker 1: little baby aspen that's sprout up from the ground from well,
Speaker 1: I was about to say, from Pando. Uh. They eat
Speaker 1: them so fast it never almost has a chance to
Speaker 1: become part of Fando, right, like Pando doesn't. They are
Speaker 1: doing studies now. Panda is old. They're old trees. It's
Speaker 1: a bunch of senior citizens hanging out holding hands. There's
Speaker 1: not a youngster among them, right, And that's not good,
Speaker 1: whether it's a human civilization or population or a population
Speaker 1: of uh, you know, aspen clones. You want like all
Speaker 1: stages of life. You want mature trees, middle aged trees,
Speaker 1: young trees, saplings, you want all that. And if you
Speaker 1: have nothing but old trees, those old trees, remember they
Speaker 1: only live about seventy five years, so as they start
Speaker 1: to die, that means Pando is dying. As as long
Speaker 1: as an aspen clone is replacing itself, it's fine, it's healthy.
Speaker 1: But if it's not, then it's in big, big trouble.
Speaker 1: And apparently Pando is in big, big trouble and has
Speaker 1: been for some years now because of overgrazing and over browsing,
Speaker 1: not just with like cattle, like grazing cattle, which apparently
Speaker 1: happens on Pando land, but also UM the mule, deer
Speaker 1: and elk populations are supposedly booming in Utah in the
Speaker 1: area where Pando lives. Yeah, and they're they're you know,
Speaker 1: they're able to prove this now, uh. In a couple
Speaker 1: of ways, UM in the US Forestry Service clear cut
Speaker 1: fifteen full acres of Pando right in the middle of
Speaker 1: it and fenced off about a third of this left
Speaker 1: the other two thirds, uh, just to you know, do
Speaker 1: do what it would do. And the fenced part came
Speaker 1: back really healthy, which was a very clear indicator that
Speaker 1: because uh, there wasn't anything there to eat these little
Speaker 1: seedlings that pop up that that's the big diff Um.
Speaker 1: So that was uh. In two thousand thirteen, they fenced
Speaker 1: off and area from Uh. I love the word ungulates.
Speaker 1: It's any kind of hoofed animal, whether natural or just
Speaker 1: you know, someone's cattle, because like you said, how many
Speaker 1: how many weeks a year do they allow cattle? A
Speaker 1: couple of weeks? Two weeks? But I think like each
Speaker 1: rancher gets two weeks there. I don't think it's like, hey,
Speaker 1: everybody bring your cattle to Panda land for like a
Speaker 1: two week period, although I could be wrong. Pando pandas
Speaker 1: like please please don't not again. Yeah. So in two
Speaker 1: thousand thirteen, they they fenced off this area and are
Speaker 1: gonna leave it that way. And this is all part
Speaker 1: of a study. UM. A nonprofit group of conservationists got
Speaker 1: together with the US Force Service to kind of check
Speaker 1: out what happens. And then this year that's why it's
Speaker 1: what's current, Like you said, at the beginning, these these
Speaker 1: results are coming in and it's pretty obvious what's going on.
Speaker 1: It is. So number one, it's the it's the over browsing,
Speaker 1: especially among elkin mule deer UM. But also number two, uh,
Speaker 1: it's the um the fact that the fences aren't necessarily
Speaker 1: working as well. So like, the fences are doing the
Speaker 1: best that they can and the unfenced area is in
Speaker 1: even bigger trouble. But even the fences they're using, the
Speaker 1: mule deer are able to hop over and eat these
Speaker 1: shoots um. And so you think, okay, well that's the
Speaker 1: mule deer's fault. Let's just kill a bunch of mule deer. Well,
Speaker 1: the problem is and this is so we've i should say,
Speaker 1: we've reached like a point of contention here because the
Speaker 1: guys um led by the researchers, led by a guy
Speaker 1: at the university or Utah State University, Paul Rodgers. He
Speaker 1: is a an ecologist, and he's clearly he's among a
Speaker 1: group who are saying the Utah fish and wildlife are
Speaker 1: are they are overpopulating the area with elk and mule
Speaker 1: deer because they make money from hunting licenses and as
Speaker 1: like the more l can mule deer there are, the
Speaker 1: more hunting of those things that can go on, the
Speaker 1: more the state UM Wildlife Commission can take in hunting licenses, right,
Speaker 1: hunting license fees, Yeah, revenue, And so the state is like, no,
Speaker 1: that's not it. Actually elk and a mule deer are
Speaker 1: lower than ever. Whether that's the case or not, whether
Speaker 1: they're being managed in correctly or not, it does seem
Speaker 1: pretty clearly that at the very least overbrowsing by mule
Speaker 1: deer and elk is a major major factor, if not
Speaker 1: the dominant factor in what's killing panda off. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: this goes back even further because, like you were saying,
Speaker 1: touch one thing here and it affects something over there.
Speaker 1: This can even be separated by like a hundred years.
Speaker 1: Go back to the early nineteen hundreds, when people in
Speaker 1: this country, uh, in North America as a whole hunted wolves,
Speaker 1: hunted mountain lines and mountain lions, hunted grizzly bears. Uh
Speaker 1: what is what are they? They are animals that eat
Speaker 1: mule deer and elk. So it's it's called an effect
Speaker 1: here a hundred plus years later, where there aren't a
Speaker 1: lot of apex predators out there keeping these helping to
Speaker 1: keep these deer population in check. So there's been talk
Speaker 1: here and there. I don't I mean, they're not gonna
Speaker 1: do it now that they said unequivocally. They're not like,
Speaker 1: should we reintroduce wolves to the ecosystem because that's a
Speaker 1: very national natural predator prey cycle that goes on that
Speaker 1: is not happening right now. No. And I mean it's
Speaker 1: like hunters coal uh, that is to say, shoot mule
Speaker 1: deer and elkins stuff like that. So the population, it's
Speaker 1: not like it's getting out of hand. And if it
Speaker 1: ever did, they would just have like open season on
Speaker 1: these things, right, And if it ever did, they would
Speaker 1: just sell more hunting licenses. I don't think that that's
Speaker 1: the issue. What the what Paul Rodgers and some of
Speaker 1: his fellow A collegists are saying is that if the
Speaker 1: presence of like wolves and bears and mountain lions is
Speaker 1: known in an area, the elkin, the mule deer, they're
Speaker 1: not just gonna stay in one place for very long.
Speaker 1: They're going to constantly be on the move. And so
Speaker 1: even if they are going through with a big population
Speaker 1: eating a bunch of shoots off of something like Pando.
Speaker 1: They're not going to be doing it in the same place,
Speaker 1: so the panda will be able to recover over time
Speaker 1: because that browsing will be distributed. Whereas now it's like,
Speaker 1: I don't feel like going ten miles down the mountain.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna stay right here and just keep eating Pando
Speaker 1: until Pando dies. Yeah, there's no wolves, right, there's no bears,
Speaker 1: or least not enough to to scare me and my
Speaker 1: my gang here. Yeah. Yeah, they call it an ecology
Speaker 1: of fear. I've never heard of that, haven't either, And yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's really interesting though that they and and I
Speaker 1: guess it takes you know, a hundred plus years too
Speaker 1: to create this kind of uh almost called it a culture.
Speaker 1: It kind of is sort of there's a culture among
Speaker 1: these herds of hooved animals to where they're just like
Speaker 1: you said, They're like, no, you know, there's nothing around
Speaker 1: here to hunt me, So I'm just gonna look at
Speaker 1: all this tasty aspen babies. I'm gonna eat them all. Yeah,
Speaker 1: what am I chump? I'm not going anywhere. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: really interesting, it is. And then there's I and like
Speaker 1: it's not like I'm a wildlife ecologist or a biologist
Speaker 1: or have any formal training in it whatsoever. But I
Speaker 1: tend to think that it's not just over browsing. I
Speaker 1: think that they the fact that there are people that
Speaker 1: live in Pando means that the Forest Service says, well,
Speaker 1: we we have to control wildfire. You don't let wildfire
Speaker 1: go any longer. Um, And so then you've got conifer
Speaker 1: um forest coming in moving in on Pando too. I
Speaker 1: think that that's probably part of the issue as well.
Speaker 1: So the key is, Chuck, is to put up better
Speaker 1: fences and let the fires go. Yeah, burn, baby, burn burn,
Speaker 1: Just don't burn the fences down. Yeah. I don't know
Speaker 1: what they were doing with those little three foot fences anyway, No,
Speaker 1: because a mule deer just hops right over, just so easy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's all very sad. Mean, panda is such an amazing
Speaker 1: I don't know, such an amazing thing in this in
Speaker 1: this country. And it's going bye bye. It is it is,
Speaker 1: it's it is said, um yeah, and I mean part
Speaker 1: of it is like, well, yes it's I mean, it's
Speaker 1: an aspen stand. But it's possibly the oldest and definitely
Speaker 1: the most massive organism on Earth, which seems like it
Speaker 1: should get like a little extra attention just for that,
Speaker 1: you know. But then you ask like, well, is that
Speaker 1: just dumbly sentimental? Why not save everything? Why? Why why
Speaker 1: just focus all of your attention on this one thing?
Speaker 1: And then the other part of me says, well, if
Speaker 1: you focus attention on this one thing, you come to
Speaker 1: realize that all this other stuff is in danger as well,
Speaker 1: and you start to care. So maybe pandas like just
Speaker 1: the poster child for getting people into ecology a little more,
Speaker 1: kind of like the Great Barrier Reef, you know, Superstar
Speaker 1: of the Ocean that is uh kind of quickly going away. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's all sad. I'm depressed now. Yeah, I mean too.
Speaker 1: I was kind of hoping to end this on a
Speaker 1: high note. Well, you know, despite what happens to Pando,
Speaker 1: it's not like this is the death of the the
Speaker 1: aspen in North America. This is Pando. Yeah, there are
Speaker 1: plenty of them in uh. And I encourage you to
Speaker 1: go sit among the trees when the breeze is blowing
Speaker 1: in the fall and tell us your experience. It's it's amazing.
Speaker 1: It's a light and sound show. Nice. Um, I got
Speaker 1: a couple more things. Do you want to talk about
Speaker 1: some of the other biggest or oldest stuff on Earth? Sure?
Speaker 1: So I mentioned that giant mushroom in Oregon. Isn't that
Speaker 1: how they say Oregon? Oregon? Oregon? Um? It is an
Speaker 1: Armillaria Ostoyer specimen and it covers acres. PANDO covers a
Speaker 1: hundred and six This covers acres of Mallard National Forests
Speaker 1: in Oregon, UM. But they only think that it's just
Speaker 1: a couple of thousand years old, and that's just that's
Speaker 1: just area that's not mass. Yeah. I think I learned
Speaker 1: about PANDO a few years ago when I was trying
Speaker 1: to find out the oldest tree. There's like a sequoia
Speaker 1: that's pretty old, right or is it the biggest? You know.
Speaker 1: I can't remember where I ended up as far as
Speaker 1: that result goes, but I know that's where I found
Speaker 1: out about PANDO. And I was like, what And there
Speaker 1: are some old trees. There's like some bristle comb pines
Speaker 1: in California that are about five thousand years old. That's
Speaker 1: pretty old for a tree. There's a creas salt bush
Speaker 1: that's at least eleven thousand, seven hundred years old. And
Speaker 1: then have you heard of um glass sponges. There are
Speaker 1: glass sponges. They live in the water off of Antarctica.
Speaker 1: They lived to about fifteen thousand years old. A sponge.
Speaker 1: Who'd have thought, you know, amazing? You got anything else?
Speaker 1: I got nothing now? Okay, well then, uh, we'll just
Speaker 1: put out a call for everybody to save Pando. Okay, yes,
Speaker 1: send us. Uh if you've actually been to Pando or
Speaker 1: in in Pando on Pando on Pando, Yeah, in Pando
Speaker 1: that's gross. Uh, send us. I want to I want
Speaker 1: to hear about this experience. Okay, yes, please to Uh.
Speaker 1: And in the meantime, how about a listener mail. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call this. UM, we got a couple on
Speaker 1: robin Hood. I'll read these these couple in the next
Speaker 1: two episodes. Hey guys, Uh, every episode you release, it's
Speaker 1: done to such a high standard. It's clear that the
Speaker 1: true effort and love of the job is poured into
Speaker 1: every session in the studio. You might get a little
Speaker 1: too much credit. Joey Uh. The episode on robin Hood
Speaker 1: especially piqued my interest, though as I am from Nottingham
Speaker 1: sure myself and I live only about ten miles a
Speaker 1: from rain Worth. The area of Sherwood Forest where Robin
Speaker 1: Hood and his men are fabled to have resided or
Speaker 1: at least spent a lot of their time in this
Speaker 1: area is the major oak of Sherwood Forest, which is
Speaker 1: said to be the location they chose for shelter. It
Speaker 1: is between eight hundred to a thousand years old and
Speaker 1: is now held up by a series of poles due
Speaker 1: to his age and bad health. Interesting. Maybe they should
Speaker 1: do that with Bando. I think I saw that tree.
Speaker 1: Actually I saw something on it. Oh yeah, when doing
Speaker 1: panda research would have been like, gosh, this trees everywhere. Uh.
Speaker 1: The episode was so well done. You taught me new information.
Speaker 1: Even though I've been to the woods and Visitor Center
Speaker 1: a few times, I have taken my children as well,
Speaker 1: and they also love the legend myth of Robin Hood.
Speaker 1: My father in law happens to be called Robin and
Speaker 1: resides in the Sherwood district, so I sometimes dropped little
Speaker 1: hints to my young children that he could possibly be
Speaker 1: the Robin of Sherwood. I lost all credibility with them.
Speaker 1: They love it, even though I think they're onto the ruse.
Speaker 1: Really really looking forward to your legendary Halloween episode. I'm
Speaker 1: a huge fan of horror and I am actually in
Speaker 1: a horror punk rock band called Headstone Horrors based in Nottingham, UK.
Speaker 1: So this is an amazing busy and exciting time of
Speaker 1: the year for us. I bet they book a lot
Speaker 1: of gigs in October. Don't you think I would guess
Speaker 1: so Headstone Horrors, I would guess January is not a
Speaker 1: huge month for him. No, no or Christmas or Christmas season.
Speaker 1: Everybody Headstone Horrors Christmas album. Uh, It's an amazing busy
Speaker 1: and exciting time of year for us. I would love
Speaker 1: to send you a C D T T shirts if
Speaker 1: you like. Just let me know your size as you want,
Speaker 1: and I'll pack them up and send them on their way.
Speaker 1: That is from Joey Gathercole of shere would, son of
Speaker 1: Robin perhaps father of incredible this Children. Well thanks a lot, buddy,
Speaker 1: that was fantastic. I appreciate the offer for the shirt.
Speaker 1: I think we will be taking you up on that. Uh.
Speaker 1: And in the meantime, if you out there want to
Speaker 1: get in touch with us to let us know you're interesting.
Speaker 1: Amazing story of how you fib to your children, We'd
Speaker 1: love to hear that you can go to stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know dot com and find all of our social links.
Speaker 1: I'm also at the Josh clark Way dot com and
Speaker 1: you can send me, Chuck and Jerry All an email
Speaker 1: to Stuff podcast how stuff Works dot com. For more
Speaker 1: on this and thousands of other topics. Is it how
Speaker 1: stuff Works dot com