Welcome to You Ask Andy

Larry Harrouns age 15, Galena, ohio,

Did the ginkgo survive the Ice Ages?

The pretty ginkgo tree certainly thrived in America before the Ice Ages. Andy owns a piece of the petrified wood that flourished here in the sunshine of millions of years ago. Time, pressure and running water have turned it to pale, precious opal. Andy’s ginkgo grew along with redwoods, birch, beech and locust beside the hurrying Columbia river in what is now the State of Washington,

Other ginkgos and trees like them flourished millions of years ago in parts of Asia. the British Isles and other places in Europe, Ginkgos thrived along with magnolias as far north as Alaska, The modern ginkgo‑has not changed much from its remote ancestors. Its relatives and similar trees have perished from the earth. The ginkgo still bears the same fan‑:shaped leaves, thin straggly branches and small berries, It has been called a living fossil

We know for sure that ginkgos were ginkgos when the long reign of the dinosaurs came to an end some 60 million years ago, But today, so far as we know, none of the dainty trees grow wild. In China they have become known as sacred trees, Some that ornament the temple grounds there are said to be almost a thousand years old. They grow for us in gardens and along the cement city side walks. The ginkgo is a sturdy tree and as a rule needs no pampering.

Somehow the hardy little trees managed to survive the Ice Ages of the past million years. We do not know how they did it. Mankind was far too busy protecting himself and his family from the bitter weather to frind time to shelter a tree, The glaciers swept all before them as they crept southward, Plants, trees and whole forests were buried under iae a mile thick. A few clumps of redwoods managed to survive in islands between tongues of creeping ice. South of the glaciers, oaks, elms and beeches survived and suited themselves to a cooler climate.

Somewhere our ginkgo also managed to survive. It failed in Alaska and northwestern United States. You can find a petrified Ginkgo Forest near Yellowstone National, but no ginkgos still grow wild there.  In this area they may have perished under volcanic ash millions of years ago.

A few of the trees may have survived and continued to grow wild in southern China. There they were discovered by man as he learned to be a gardener, The pretty trees were treasured and admired which was lucky for us and for the ginkgo, For meanwhile, the wild ginkgos were dying out.  All that we have are cultivated trees So far as we know all the ginkgos in other parks, cities and gardens are descended from those that were treasured and pampered in ancient China; Their ancestory goes back to the family of ginkgos that flourished in many parts of the world millions of years before the lee Ages came and went.

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