[NAFEX] Tree from 2,000-year-old seed is doing well

Ernest Plutko ernestplutko at wiktel.com
Sat Jun 14 17:34:49 EDT 2008


Another date palm seed was sprouted in 1966 from a seed found at King
Herod's fortress.  I read about it previously and it was on TV news
today with a picture of tree.  Date palm seeds are hardy.

---- Original Message ----
From: bmn at iglou.com
To: nafex at lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: RE: [NAFEX] Tree from 2,000-year-old seed is doing well
Date: Fri, 13 Jun 2008 09:12:29 -0400

>  Tree from 2,000-year-old seed is doing well
>
>By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer Thu Jun 12, 3:42 PM ET
>
>WASHINGTON - Just over three years old and about four-feet tall, 
>Methuselah is growing well. "It's lovely," Dr. Sarah Sallon said of
>the 
>date palm, whose parents may have provided food for the besieged Jews
>at 
>Masada some 2,000 years ago.
>
>The little tree was sprouted in 2005 from a seed recovered from
>Masada, 
>where rebelling Jews committed suicide rather than surrender to Roman
>
>attackers.
>
>Radiocarbon dating of seed fragments clinging to its root, as well as
>
>other seeds found with it that didn't sprout, indicate they were
>about 
>2,000 years old — the oldest seed known to have been sprouted and
>grown.
>
>Sallon, director of the Louis L. Borick Natural Medicine Research
>Center 
>at Hadassah Medical Organization in Israel, updates the saga of 
>Methuselah in Friday's edition of the journal Science.
>
>One thing they don't know yet is whether it's a boy or girl. Date
>palms 
>differ by sex, but experts can't tell the difference until the tree
>is 
>six or seven years old, Sallon said.
>
>She hopes there's a chance to use it to restore the extinct Judean
>date 
>palm, once prized not only for its fruit but also for medicinal uses.
>
>The researchers have had a look at the plant's DNA, however, and
>found 
>it shares just over half its genes with modern date cultivars.
>
>"Part of our project is to preserve ancient knowledge of how plants
>were 
>used," Sallon said in a telephone interview. "To domesticate them so
>we 
>have a ready source of raw material."
>
>Her Middle Eastern Medicinal Plant Project is working to conserve and
>
>reintroduce plants to the region where they once lived.
>
>"Many species are endangered and becoming extinct. Raising the dead
>is 
>very difficult, so it's better to preserve them before they become 
>extinct," she said.
>
>The oldest documented seed to be grown previously was a
>1,300-year-old 
>lotus, Sallon said.
>___
>
>On the Net:
>Science: http://www.sciencemag.org
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