# Did I read right a tree 1/2 mile wide?



## Rarest wood (Feb 18, 2009)

I was reading this article and they stated a petrified tree has been found half a mile wide have any of you been there? if so what did you see and can you get me some to turn? :biggrin:

its here http://s8int.com/WordPress/?p=975:confused:


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## amosfella (Feb 18, 2009)

have you every tried cutting petrified wood??  It's not fun.  Need rock saws, and other special tools.  You'd never lathe it.  You'd need to grind it down with diamond saws.  

That being said, it would make a heck of a cool pen, especially if it has opal embedded in it.


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## Dario (Feb 18, 2009)

Rarest wood said:


> half a mile *wide*



Yep you read wrong.  It said "up to 1/2 mile in *circumference*" that is huge but your account more than tripled its diameter.


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## Rarest wood (Feb 18, 2009)

Dario said:


> Yep you read wrong.  It said "up to 1/2 mile in circumference" that is huge but your account more than tripled it.


  either way it makes the giant (sic) sequoia look like a shrub


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## Dario (Feb 18, 2009)

Maybe...I haven't read all of it but it could be an exaggeration.  Possibly a forest clump of giants that he thought is one.  DUNNO.


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## bitshird (Feb 18, 2009)

Sure does that gives you a tree of about 840 ft diameter which is one big tree, I've cut quite a bit of petrified wood from the petrified forest in Arizona, also some limb casts which are agatized replacement of actual tree limbs, got them in Idaho. some petrified wood is some pretty rock, it's basically agatized wood, but a tree 840 ft across, WOW that is staggering.


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## TurnedAround (Feb 18, 2009)

Yep, that's gotta be an exaggeration. A circumference of a half a mile comes out to a diameter of 800+ feet. For a tree to be 400' high and 800' through sounds weird to me. Some trees are disproportionately wide, like the Baobab, but I seriously doubt this account is true.

Ed


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## btboone (Feb 18, 2009)

I don't think it would stand up to scientific scrutiny.  Sounds like a religious site that is trying to create "evidence" of a huge flood.  Release the geologists on it to find out what it really is.


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## maxwell_smart007 (Feb 18, 2009)

We have some very large trees alive right now...the General Sherman sequoia is quite large...Now consider that during the time of the dinosaurs and before, some animals and trees were MUCH bigger than they are now...warmer climate and alll....

However, to have suddenly found a tree _that _large, with no basis of comparison to other trees of even roughly similar size, is a bit hard to swallow.


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## Chasper (Feb 18, 2009)

I'm extremely skeptical.  I've spent quite a lot of time rockhounding in the Black Hills.  I've spent a few days in the Museum of Geology at the SD School of Mines and Technology in Rapid City http://sdmines.sdsmt.edu/museum  I'm pretty sure they don't know about these giant petrified trees.  There is plenty of petrified wood in the area, I've found it myself. This is a hoax, or maybe a good joke.


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## low_48 (Feb 19, 2009)

Maybe it was an aspen. The entire grove of aspens are genetically identical, making it one organism.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pando_(tree)


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## pssherman (Feb 19, 2009)

Do you realize that a tree trunk with a circumference of 1/2 mile would cover 12.7 acres?


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## amosfella (Feb 19, 2009)

are you sure you don't mean 127 acres??  a half mile square is 160 acres.


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## GouletPens (Feb 19, 2009)

I'm not sure I believe it just doing some rought numbers about the height that would make the tree.....even a modest estimate of a squatty looking tree with an 800' plus trunk would have to make the thing miles high, sending it into separate layers of the atmosphere where the oxygen and CO2 levels would drastically change.....I can't really think what a tree would look like shooting miles up into the atmosphere. A trunk that large would have to have a root system that either goes down into deep layers of bedrock (no nutrients for them there) or spread hundreds of miles across the topsoil which would make a tree that size quite weak at the base. It just doesn't make logical sense. But hey, if it's on the internet, it must be true!!!!


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## pssherman (Feb 19, 2009)

amosfella said:


> are you sure you don't mean 127 acres??  a half mile square is 160 acres.



Yea, I made a mistake, dropped a digit. It should be 125.7 acres.


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## pssherman (Feb 19, 2009)

Brian,
This tree couldn't possibly be miles high. The maximum height a tree can grow depends on the capillary action that draws the sap up through the veins. The tallest trees ever recorded are the Eucalyptus trees (Australia) which have reached heights in the range of 400 to 500 feet.


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## Skye (Feb 19, 2009)

I'm going to have to file this under "_AAAAaaaaaaaanyway...._"


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## BullDurham (Feb 19, 2009)

Guess we found Jack's Bean stork!


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## Skye (Feb 19, 2009)

BullDurham said:


> Guess we found Jack's Bean stork!



Stalk. A stork is a bird.

A little early in the day to be hittin' the sauce!


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## BullDurham (Feb 19, 2009)

For whom. It is after 4 here.


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## DCBluesman (Feb 19, 2009)

It's 5 o'clock somewhere.


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## GouletPens (Feb 19, 2009)

pssherman said:


> Brian,
> This tree couldn't possibly be miles high. The maximum height a tree can grow depends on the capillary action that draws the sap up through the veins. The tallest trees ever recorded are the Eucalyptus trees (Australia) which have reached heights in the range of 400 to 500 feet.


 Precisely my point! A tree can't be half a mile around and only 400 feet tall. It's a fable!


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