In a 15-month period between 2020 and 2021, an estimated 13 to 19 percent of the world’s redwood tree population was killed or fatally injured, according to a National Park Service report. Their numbers are especially staggering, scientists say, given how few died in previous centuries.
“I’ve counted a lot of dead giant sequoias, and I don’t like it,” said Mr. Dickman, the forest ecologist who spent last fall counting the trees downed by the Windy fire. At the end of the day, Mr. Dickman would get into his car, put his head on the wheel and sob.
“It’s like counting dead people,” he added. “It blew me away.”
Officials said Tuesday morning that Mariposa Grove’s mature giant sequoias have “so far avoided major damage” from the fire and that they are confident they can be saved.
The cause of the Washburn fire is under investigation, but it is most likely human-caused, Yosemite National Park Superintendent Cicely Muldoon said at a community meeting Monday night.
“As you all know, there was no lightning that day,” Ms Muldoon said.
As much as the battle to save the redwoods is a battle against the relentless force of global warming, it is also an attempt to save a piece of the ancient history and cultural heritage of the West. Mariposa Grove — first protected by Abraham Lincoln in 1864 — was “the root of the entire national park system,” Ms. Muldoon noted.
An image of a Grizzly Giant taken in 1861 by Carlton Watkins was among the first pictures of Yosemite sent east, according to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and “helped solidify the idea that Yosemite was a relic of North America’s Eden.”
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