The Looming Threat of Climate Change

Will the Giants Survive?

The World’s Largest Trees

The giant sequoias of California’s Sierra Nevada are not only the world’s largest living species but one of the longest living organisms on Earth.

With a volume of over 52,500 cubic feet, you could fill it with water and take a bath every day for 27 years and still not run out of water.  Standing proudly at over 275 feet tall, a 6-foot tall human staring up at it is about equivalent to a tiny little mouse standing at your feet looking up at you.

General Sherman is estimated to be around 2,300 to 2,700 years old.  Imagine all the changes that have taken place in this world during its lifetime – the rise and fall of the Roman Empire, World War II, the first man landing on the moon… Yet, there it proudly stands in the exact same spot its seedling sprouted back in a time when most historians believe Jesus was born.  And General Sherman is not alone.  It is believed that 5 of the 10 world’s largest trees are found alongside it in the Giant Forest.

What It Feels Like to Walk Among Giants

They have this remarkable way of making you feel oh so small and insignificant in this vast, incredible universe as if all of life’s problems are completely trivial in nature.  It’s almost as if you can feel the energy of the ancients running through your veins standing amongst them, overwhelming your senses and instilling the most incredible sense of awe. I swear these groves of giants are no less inspiring than the Sistine Chapel itself.

The Threat of Climate Change

Once thought to be immune to insects, drought and wildfire, the magnificent sequoias are now facing the very real threat of climate change which puts their very existence at risk.

Like most species on this planet, sequoias need ideal growing conditions to thrive. They require moist, rich, ph balanced soil, and their roots are shallow so it must be well-drained. They also need dry mountain air and low-intensity fire for their cones to open and release seeds.

Once found throughout the northern hemisphere, man’s behavior and these specific climate requirements have resulted in the last remaining trees being limited to just 75 groves scattered across a narrow 260-mile strip of land in the western Sierra Nevada between 5,000 to 7,000 feet elevation. This is an area almost 20 times smaller than the county of Los Angeles. 

It is predicted that tens of thousands of the ancient trees will face destruction from drought and climate-induced pathogens.  Warmer temperatures have been causing severe drought conditions in all of California that put increased stress on the environment.  Mature sequoias depend on deep ground water from snowpack to get them through these drought conditions, but snowpack is decreasing.  Even worse, the seedlings and younger trees that don’t have the well-developed root systems will undoubtedly have insufficient water to endure the longer and warmer summers ahead.  No major forest including the sequoias is immune to drought induced mortality.

In fact, the severe droughts of the 2010’s left many sequoias under atypical stress from the intense lack of water. Trees that would normally live a long life, naturally dying under their own weight are now found dying standing up, their foliage atypically brown from lack of water. A phenomenon that has scientists and environmentalists scrambling to find solutions.

Drought further puts the sequoias at risk of disease and beetles that the trees are otherwise protected from. The reason appears to be two-fold. Drought stressed trees are weaker, and climate change has allowed native bark beetle populations to flourish and deadly infestations to thrive. Another side effect of drought is fires. Although sequoias need low-intensity fire to repopulate, the climate crisis and build-up of fuels from hundreds of years of fire suppression have led to high-intensity, out of control fires that now threaten them.

It is also not a simple task to replant more of these trees elsewhere.  Although some have been successfully replanted in other countries, they’ve never been able to naturally reseed themselves outside their native narrow range.

What Can Be Done?

There are things we can do to mitigate the effects of climate change on these forests including prescribed fires and thinning to reduce the number of trees competing for water.   But what can we as individuals do?

The problem may seem so large that we think we have no impact or control over things, so we do nothing. Yet, this is exactly the reason we are where we are.  Every single thing we do has an impact.  Every decision we make and the decisions of those around us combined have a direct impact, in fact a huge impact, on our environment.

To learn about 10 things YOU can do to help protect this planet and these giant sequoias, click here.