Methuselah is a -year-old Great Basin bristlecone pine (''Pinus longaeva'') tree growing high in the White Mountains of Inyo County in eastern

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

. It is recognized as the non- clonal tree with the greatest confirmed age in the world. Its old age is a result of harsh weather and a lack of nutrients, which slow down the decaying process. The tree's name refers to the biblical patriarch Methuselah, who is said to have reached 969 years of age before his death, thus becoming synonymous with longevity or old age in many European languages including English.

Geography

Methuselah is located between above sea level in the "Methuselah Grove" in the

Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest The Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest is a protected area high in the White Mountains (California), White Mountains in Inyo County, California, Inyo County in eastern California. Geography The forest is east of the Owens Valley, high on the east ...

within the Inyo National Forest. The

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does not disclose its exact location, although the tree's location is now widely known and available on the internet following a high-profile leak in 2021 after photos of the exact tree were found in a National Geographic article as well as its appearance in a documentary. The tree's location was withheld for years out of fear the tree would be damaged.

Status as oldest known tree

The claim that Methuselah is the oldest known tree is controversial. Methuselah was 4,789 years old when sampled in 1957 by Edmund Schulman and Tom Harlan, with an estimated germination date of 2833 BC. Dendrochronologist Matthew Salzer of the University of Arizona has been unable to reproduce Schulman's age estimate, due to a missing core. Salzer's estimate is approximately years old.

Other bristlecones

Another bristlecone specimen, WPN-114, nicknamed "

Prometheus In Greek mythology, Prometheus (; , , possibly meaning "forethought")Smith"Prometheus". is a Titans, Titan. He is best known for defying the Olympian gods by taking theft of fire, fire from them and giving it to humanity in the form of technol ...

", was more than 4,844 years old when cut down in 1964, with an estimated germination date of 2880 BC. A

dendrochronology Dendrochronology (or tree-ring dating) is the scientific method of chronological dating, dating tree rings (also called growth rings) to the exact year they were formed in a tree. As well as dating them, this can give data for dendroclimatology, ...

, based on these trees and other

bristlecone pine The term bristlecone pine covers three species of pine tree (family Pinaceae, genus ''Pinus'', subsection ''Balfourianae''). All three species are long-lived and highly resilient to harsh weather and bad soils. One of the three species, ''Pinus ...

samples, extends back to about 9000 BC, albeit with a single gap of about 500 years. An older bristlecone pine was reportedly discovered by Tom Harlan in 2009, based on a sample core collected in 1957. According to Harlan, the tree was 5,062 years old and still living in 2010. Neither the tree nor the sample core could be located after Harlan's death in 2013.

Non-bristlecones

The Alerce Milenario in Chile was estimated in 2022 to be over 5000 years old, but broad scientific consensus has not been reached on its age. The Llangernyw Yew in Wales (2,000-5,000 years old) and the Fortingall Yew in Scotland (2,000-9,000 years old) have some age estimates exceeding that of Methuselah, though yews are notoriously hard to date and newer studies indicate younger ages of 2,000-3,000 years old.

Clonal organisms

Other, longer-lived organisms are

clonal colonies A clonal colony or genet is a group of genetically identical individuals, such as plants, fungi, or bacteria, that have grown in a given location, all originating vegetatively, not sexually, from a single ancestor. In plants, an individual in ...

, such as a quaking aspen (''Populus tremuloides'') colony named " Pando" in the Fish Lake National Forest in south-central

Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...

that has been estimated to be 80,000 years old, although precise estimates of clonal organisms such as this aspen colony are impossible with current technologies, and other scientific attempts to age Pando have estimated it may be much younger; the 11,700-year-old creosote bush (''Larrea tridentata'') colony, named " King Clone", in the

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near the Lucerne Valley in

; and the 9,500-year-old Norway spruce (''Picea abies'') colony named "

Old Tjikko Old Tjikko is an approximately -year old Norway spruce, located in the Dalarna province in Sweden. Old Tjikko originally gained fame as the "world's oldest tree". Old Tjikko is, however, a clonal tree that has regenerated new trunks, branches ...

" in

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References