petrified forest
Petrified wood, also known as petrified tree (from Ancient Greek meaning 'rock' or 'stone'; literally 'wood turned into stone'), is the name given to a special type of ''fossilized wood'', the fossilized remains of terrestrial vegetation. ''P ...
located in
Sonoma County, California
Sonoma County () is a county (United States), county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, its population was 488,863. Its county seat and largest city is Santa Rosa, California, Santa Rosa. It is to the n ...
, in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
. It is the only petrified forest in California from the
Pliocene
The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58 It also has the largest petrified trees in the world. The forest is now open to the public to visit after restoration from damage caused by the Napa and Sonoma fires of 2017.
History
Geological history
Approximately 3.4 million years ago, a
volcano
A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface.
On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates are ...
eruption at Mount St. Helena caused the trees to become petrified in a process took thousands of years to complete. Diane Erwin, from the University of California, Berkeley, stated in 2012, that the petrified forest shows that redwood trees were once located more inland, unlike their contemporary descendants that are primarily coastal. The Palynological Society calls the forest "one of the finest examples in the world of an ancient forest."
19th century
The forest was discovered in 1870 by
Othniel Charles Marsh
Othniel Charles Marsh (October 29, 1831 – March 18, 1899) was an American professor of Paleontology in Yale College and President of the National Academy of Sciences. He was one of the preeminent scientists in the field of paleontology. Among h ...
. Marsh determined that the petrified trees were ''
Sequoia langsdorfii
Sequoia, Sequoya or Sequoyah may refer to:
Science and technology Biology
* Sequoioideae, a three-genus subfamily of the cypress family
** ''Sequoia'' (genus), a genus with one living and several fossil species
*** ''Sequoia sempervirens'', coa ...
'' from the Sequoia genus. There is also one petrified
pine tree
A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. The World Flora Online created by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Missouri Botanical Garden accepts ...
in the forest.
Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson (born Robert Lewis Balfour Stevenson; 13 November 1850 – 3 December 1894) was a Scottish novelist, essayist, poet and travel writer. He is best known for works such as ''Treasure Island'', ''Strange Case of Dr Jekyll a ...
mentioned the forest in his book ''
The Silverado Squatters
''The Silverado Squatters'' (1883) is a Travel literature, travel memoir by Robert Louis Stevenson of his two-month honeymoon trip with Fanny Vandegrift (and her son Lloyd Osbourne) to Napa Valley, California, in 1880.
Background
In July 1879, ...
'' (1883).
Today
Since the early 20th century, the same Calistoga-based family has maintained and operated the forest. The forest was bought by Ollie Orre Bockee, from M.C. Meeker, around 1912, for a total cost of $14,000. Bockee continued to purchase surrounding land and acquired a total of 845 acres. Bockee opened the property to tourists around 1914 and charged 50 cents per person. When Bockee died in 1950, her sister became the owner of the property, and Bockee's direct descendants maintain it today. It was listed on the
California Historical Landmarks
A California Historical Landmark (CHL) is a building, structure, site, or place in California that has been determined to have statewide historical landmark significance.
Criteria
Historical significance is determined by meeting at least one of ...
list on January 31, 1978. In 2012, the family started to send fossilized
pollen
Pollen is a powdery substance produced by seed plants. It consists of pollen grains (highly reduced microgametophytes), which produce male gametes (sperm cells). Pollen grains have a hard coat made of sporopollenin that protects the gametophyt ...
samples to the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
for research.
Many of the petrified trees in the forest have nicknames, including "The Queen", which is 8 feet wide and 65 feet long. The Queen was 2,000 years old when the volcano erupted. Additional trees include "The Pit Tree" and "The Giant". There are a cluster of trees named after Ollie Orre Bockee and a tree named after Robert Louis Stevenson.