{"id":11313,"date":"2019-09-16T13:06:15","date_gmt":"2019-09-16T17:06:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/?page_id=11313"},"modified":"2024-08-20T13:17:40","modified_gmt":"2024-08-20T17:17:40","slug":"river-of-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ncseagrant.ncsu.edu\/coastwatch\/river-of-time\/","title":{"rendered":"River of Time"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n\n
North Carolina’s famous Black River holds living bald cypresses that were saplings before Rome was an empire. After finding trees over 2,000 years old, researchers say the river might even nourish bald cypresses that sprouted three millennia ago. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The rhythm of time stretches back 2,000 years through the ancient bald cypress trees in Three Sisters Swamp along the Black River in southeastern North Carolina.<\/p>\n\n\n\n New research shows the swamp holds some of the oldest trees in the world. Two bald cypress have been documented to be at least 2,624 years old and 2,088 years old, ascertained by counting their annual growth rings and through radiocarbon analysis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The venerable trees were alive centuries before the advent of Christianity and the English language. David Stahle, a researcher in the department of geosciences at the University of Arkansas, cored the trunks and established the ages of the two trees. He believes even older trees may grow in the swamp and along the river.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThere are surely multiple trees over 2,000 years old at Black River,\u201d Stahle says. \u201cIt\u2019s my belief there are some approaching, if not exceeding, 3,000 years old.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Black River has been known, for three decades, for the oldest trees on the East Coast. The previous oldest documented tree in the swamp is a bald cypress sampled in 1988 by Stahle and his colleagues. Called \u201cMethuselah,\u201d after the Biblical character who lived for 969 years, the tree was determined to have been growing in 364 A.D., making it about 1,700 years old. But the two 2,000-plus-year-old trees exceed the Methuselah tree in age by nearly 1,000 years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n