The oldest living thing on Earth has been identified as a self-cloning sea grass in the Mediterranean. The sea grass was found to be between 12,000 and 200,000 years old and was most likely to be at least 100,000 years old. Sea grass meadows can be composed of ancient giant clones - organisms stretching up to nearly 10 miles wide.Commons.Wikimedia.com
The oldest living thing on Earth has been identified as a self-cloning sea grass in the Mediterranean. The sea grass was found to be between 12,000 and 200,000 years old and was most likely to be at least 100,000 years old. Sea grass meadows can be composed of ancient giant clones - organisms stretching up to nearly 10 miles wide.Commons.Wikimedia.comKing Lomatia, an endangered species is known to be one of oldest known plant clones on Earth. Strands of genetically identical individuals of King’s Lomatia (Lomatia tasmanica) or King’s Holly are estimated to be at least 43,000 years old. They are found only in two tiny spots in the remote south-west of Tasmania. Its total population is approximately 500 plants.Wikicommons/ShantaviraThe Quaking Aspen (also called Trembling Aspen) can be identified by the smooth white bark marked with black scars, where lower branches are naturally self-pruned. Quaking Aspen leaves are somewhat heart shaped, with finely saw-toothed margins and range in size from 1.25-3" (3-8 cm) long. The leaves attach to branches via a long and flattened petiole, so that even the slightest breeze causes the leaves to flutter. This gives the overall tree the appearance that it is quaking or trembling. The quake aspen, also known as white poplar, a tree native to cooler areas of North America is more than 10,000 years old.Wikicommons/Scott CatronThe box huckleberry is a low shrub with branches that rise to about one foot from underground creeping stems, known as rhizomes. The box huckleberry stretches for hundreds of feet in all directions and every visible stem and leaf poking up from the soil belongs to just one plant. it is also known as box-leaved whortleberry, a low North American shrub that is more than 13,000 years old.Wikicommons/Mason BrockThe creosote bush is one of the most common and important plants of the warm deserts (Sonoran, Chihuahuan and Mojave Deserts) of North America but cold winters exclude it from the Great Basin Desert. The Creosote is the most drought-tolerant perennial plant of North America. It can live for at least 2 years with no water at all, by shedding its leaves and even shedding branches. The plant is found commonly in the Mojave, Sonoran, and Chihuahuan deserts of North America that is more than 11,000 years old.Wikicommons/EricA small, slow-growing tree that will, eventually, grow to 20m tall and 25cm in diameter; as the tree gets bigger, the older the crown of the tree gets to resemble a spike. The Black Spruce has pinecones, which are black, with purplish-brown seeds. This species of spruce is native to the northern regions of North America.Wikicommons/Kyloe Woods
A group of Australian scientists claim to have found the oldest living organism on the planet.
According to them, there is a patch of sea grass on the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea that spans almost 10 miles and weighs more than 6,000 tons. They believe this underwater meadow is the oldest living organism in the world.
Apparently they studied sea grass from a total of 40 underwater meadows, in an area spanning more than 2,000 miles, from Spain to Cyprus.
The analysis, published in the journal PLos ONE, found the sea grass was between 12,000 and 200,000 years old and was most likely to be at least 100,000 years old.
Meanwhile, the study also has revealed a list of, what they believe, are the other oldest living organisms in the world.
