SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY
Bristlecone's Growth May Reflect Global Warming
from the San Francisco Chronicle
Bristlecone pines, those ancient and iconic trees on many of California's mountaintops, reflect the impact of global warming in a curious way - not by dying off like coral reefs in the world's oceans, but by growing faster than at any time in the past thousands of years, scientists have discovered.
Anyone who has hiked and climbed high in the White Mountains along the Nevada border has seen and marveled at the bristlecones - some still verdant after countless centuries, but many wind-battered, twisted and nearly naked with stunted trunks lying almost flat against the barren ground - but still alive.
Now these stubborn trees that cling to life at elevations above 12,000 feet are a clear symbol of climate change, according to seven years of field research by Matthew Salzer of the University of Arizona and his colleagues.
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