Scientists have found what they believe to be the world’s earliest known fossilised forest in cliffs on the coast of South West England. It was discovered in high sandstone cliffs near Minehead, Somerset, close to a Butlin’s holiday camp.
Researchers from Cambridge and Cardiff Universities say they are the oldest fossilised trees ever found in Britain and the oldest known forest on Earth.
The trees, known as calamophyton, resemble palm trees.
Described as a kind of ‘prototype’ of today’s trees, the largest were between two and four metres tall.
The researchers identified the fossils of plants and their debris as well as fossilised tree logs and traces of roots.
They show how early trees helped shape landscapes and stabilised riverbanks and coastlines hundreds of millions of years ago.
“When I first saw pictures of the tree trunks I immediately knew what they were, based on 30 years of studying this type of tree worldwide,” said co-author Dr Christopher Berry from Cardiff’s School of Earth and Environmental Sciences.
“It was amazing to see them so near to home. But the most revealing insight comes from seeing, for the first time, these trees in the positions where they grew.”
Credit: bbc.com
