Bristlecone Pine

Where it grows

The Great Basin bristlecone pine grows on alkaline, mineral-poor, wind-scoured ridges at elevations of 2,500 to 3,600 metres in the White Mountains and Inyo National Forest of California, the Snake Range of Nevada, and the high mountains of Utah. The closely related Rocky Mountain bristlecone (Pinus aristata) occupies similar habitats further east.

How to recognise it

Old bristlecones are sculptural: ribbons of living bark cling to twisted, partly dead trunks polished by wind-borne ice for thousands of years. The dense bottle-brush sprays of five short needles persist for 30 to 40 years on a branch — exceptional longevity for any conifer needle. The small purple-brown cones are armed with the curved bristles that name the species.

Uses

Bristlecone pine has little economic value. Its scientific value, however, is immense: its annual rings, including those of dead snags lying preserved on the dry mountain slopes, supplied the calibration data that anchored radiocarbon dating back more than 9,000 years.

Oldest known

A bristlecone named Methuselah in the White Mountains has been verified at over 4,850 years old, and a second tree even older was found in 2012, surviving from before the construction of the Egyptian pyramids.