If I were to ask you what is the oldest and biggest living organism on this planet, most would probably think that it’s a blue whale or some really old tree, those would all be very good guesses. However none of these organisms comes even remotely close to what is not only the world’s largest living organism, but its oldest. What if I told you that his organism weighted 6,000,000kg and was 80,000 years old? (WikiPando) It’s called Pando or “the trembling giant” and is literally an entire forest of trees. But how can a forest of trees be one singular organism you might wonder?

Before I get into what makes this forest one singular organism, you need to know some background information about Pando. This organism is a type of tree called a quaking aspen, which are trees that look similar to birch trees in that they are white. Pando is located in Utah, and covers an area of about 106 acres. In that area there are approximately 40,000 quaking aspens that make up Pando (Loe.org). An average tree that is a part of Pando lives around 130 years, and grows up to 82ft (WikiPando). It is also important to clarify that Pando is not all of the plant life in this 106 acres, but merely all of the quaking aspens in that area.

There are several key characteristics that Pando possesses that make it one singular living organism. First off is that Pando is what is called a clonal colony, which occurs in plants, fungus and bacteria (WikiClonalColany). A clonal colony is a group of genetically identical individuals. Out of all the clonal colonies on earth, Pando is the biggest and oldest. This basically means that every single tree that makes up Pando is genetically all the same.On top of that all of the trees that make up Pando are connected by one massive underground root system (atlasobscura.com). When a new tree grows, it grows out of this root system, “This new tree has the same genetic makeup and even has genetic markers to say that it actually belongs to the first tree. To all intents and purposes it is the first tree, but in a separate place” (MostlyOdd.com). It is because all of the trees are exactly the same genetically and all connected to one another that they are considered one singular living organism.

How though could such a massive immobile living creature survive and flourish for so long, couldn’t one forest fire completely destroy Pando? These are all viable questions, the reason why Pando has been able to survive for so long is because the trees that make up Pando aren’t what keep it alive; its Pando’s root system that does. Pando’s roots system is so far underground that when a forest fire occurs it cannot burn deep enough to destroy the root system which is crucial in adding new trees to Pando. Instead of hurting Pando forest fires help Pando by killing “off the pesky invading conifers and free up space for many more extensions of Pando to be sent up” (MostlyOdd.com). The protection of Pando’s root system is what has allowed it to survive for so long, but this does not mean that Pando is invincible.

Unfortunately new research has found that Pando may be at risk of dying. One problem that Pando is facing right now is that a large amount of its trees are mature trees around the age of 130 years old. This is problematic because these trees are going to die soon and when they do there won’t be many younger trees to replace them (Loe.org). Another issue that Pando is facing is that there are currently a large number of grazing animals such as elk, deer, and cattle in the area. This is a problem for Pando because these animals tend to eat or kill the stems that will turn into new trees for Pando (Loe.org). This means that newer generations of trees to help keep Pando alive are being killed off before they get a chance to become trees. It is because there are too many mature trees in Pando right now and not enough younger trees to replace them that Pando is at risk of not only vastly shrinking in size but potentially dying.

You might be wondering how can we save Pando from naturally being destroyed? Paul Rogers, Director of the Western Aspen Alliance at Utah State University and Karen Mock, Professor of Conservation Genetics and Molecular Ecology at USU have come up with several solutions that are tricky but may work. One such solution could be to put up a very large fence all around Pando in order to keep such grazing animals like the elk and deer out. However this is problematic because something as simple as a tree falling down on the fence could cause a breach in it which could go unnoticed for a week or two because of how large Pando is. In this time period the “animals get in and they can eat everything. So you could lose essentially a year or more of trying to protect this clone with one or two small breaches and a week or two going by” (Loe.org). This is the major problem that trying to fence of Pando would face. As far as who would pay for and keep watch on this fence, the US Forest Service would. Pando is “in a touristy area near a recreational lake, and it’s also a tourist attraction in and of itself, the Pando clone”, so it is in the Forest Services interest to help protect this splendid feat of nature (Loe.org).

Heres a audio clip of Paul Rogers and Karen Mock talking about Pando:

Another idea to protect Pando could be to introduce more predators like wolves into Pando’s ecosystem or allow more hunting in the area. This would be a more natural way of protecting Pando from the damage that game animals like elk and deer pose. By adding more wolves into the ecosystem it would thin out the number of deer and elk because the wolves would kill and eat them in order to survive, which would give Pando’s stems more protection. However, this could be problematic too because the area around Pando and Pando itself is a big recreation area and tourist attraction. Adding more wolves to the ecosystem could cause unwanted and negative interaction between humans and wolves which would most likely result in less people coming to these areas.

One idea that might work the best out of all the previous ones mentioned would to allow more hunting in the area, but only specifically for the animals that are causing damage to Pando. Like any hunting area you can figure out exactly how many of these animals you can take out of the ecosystem without hurting it. It’s easy to keep track of this by making hunters tag all of their kills and report them. You could run the area in and around Pando just like any other hunting area. This would not only help reduce the numbers of grazing animals that are hurting Pando. There are many solutions that could be enacted to help protect Pando, some better than others, but it defiantly is plausible to save Pando from being destroyed.

There are many impressive and unbelievable living creatures on this planet, but by far Pando has to be one of the most amazing. While it has survived for so long it is not invincible and steps should be made to help protect and save Pando from being murdered. With proper population control for the deer, elk, cattle, and other grazing animals in the area, Pando will survive. Its mind boggling to think that there is a living organism on this planet that is as large and as old as Pando. Pando isn’t just a bunch of trees in Utah, it is an unbelievable feat of nature that has quietly stood and survived for over 80,000 years.

Here are links for all my sources:

http://loe.org/shows/segments.html?programID=13-P13-00005&segmentID=7

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pando_%28tree%29

http://www.mostlyodd.com/pando-the-one-tree-forest/

http://www.atlasobscura.com/places/pando-the-trembling-giant

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clonal_colony

Picture at the top: http://old.nationalforests.org/blog/date/2014/03

Audio Clip of Rogers and Mock: https://soundcloud.com/living-on-earth/the-worlds-oldest-organism-in