Name: Living Fossils of the Tree World
Start: 2024-11-15T11:00:00-08:00
End: 2024-11-15T13:00:00-08:00
Location: 4000 SW Fairview Blvd, Portland, OR, United States, Oregon 97221

“Living fossils” generally refer to those taxa (organisms of a named lineage) that are alive today, have been documented in the fossil record for an unusually long time, and have seemingly experienced little change over time. At Hoyt Arboretum, we have several tree species considered to be “living fossils.” Some are well-known plants that simply appear to be morphologically unchanged for a very long time and are recognized from the wild or cultivated. Others were thought to be extinct and known only from the fossil record, until living populations were (re-)discovered by scientists.
Come prepared to walk as we visit many of these distinctive trees.
About the instructor: Dr. Mandy Tu is the Plant Taxonomist & Herbarium Curator at the Hoyt Arboretum. In this position, she is responsible for collecting voucher specimens and verifying the identity of the trees within the Arboretum. She has a B.S. in Botany from the University of Washington and a Ph.D. in Plant Biology from the University of California at Davis.