Bristle Cone Pines

Here is one place that I really wanted to get to.  It was a bit of a drive.  The staff here where fantastic, not only did they answer all our questions, they even humored us when we asked some silly ones.

One thing that is interesting about these trees is that if they where not growing where they are, in such a harsh environment, they would not have lived as long as they do.  It seems the harsh environment also contributes to their age by limiting or eliminating pests, fires and other destructive forces on the trees.  The trees have adapted to the lack of water, alkali soil, high winds that sand blasts the trees with ice crystals and sand, which is why they loose their bark and looks to be the main reason they die.

This first picture is of a young Bristle cone and was in the parking area.  Age was probably several hundred years old.

This is the first plaque on the short loop from the visitor center.  I think it sums up the whole experience pretty well.  You realize that the tree in front of this plaque had died in 1676 at the age of 3200 years.  Meaning this tree died 100 years before the US was born.

I took this picture of the tree rings from of the above mentioned tree.  The second picture is zoomed into the center area to show how dense the rings are.

The following are pictures of different trees.  The cloud started to make a bit of a showing, thus providing some contrast for the sky.  The one thing that should be noted is the white/tan/brown smooth areas are dead parts of the tree.  Some of these trees look to be completely dead but you could find a strip of bark running from a root up to a little tuff of green, thus that tree is alive.  From talking with the rangers and reading about the tree, that tuff of green is as fertile and vibrant as any young tree is.  Meaning that the cone produced have the same chance of growing a new tree and young cones.  (These trees do not suffer from aging, their cells do not deteriorate like most other living organisms.)