A species back from extinction? A species of pine tree thought extinct for 2 million years has been found in Australia

Known as the Wollemi pine, the species evolved 91 million years ago, and was thought to have gone extinct 2 million years ago. However, in the blue mountains, west of Sydney a stand of 90 of these trees have been found. They were found in 1994, but their discovery has been kept quiet till now, while the national parks service of Australia has been planting small clumps of this tree in many other locations, in order to avoid this tree being lost in an accident.

This is a rare positive bit of news in a world where literally millions of species are considered endangered, from species of plant that you might never have heard of, to animals like the lion. We do not have time to celebrate for long, we must make sure as many others as possible will survive into the future.

It is sad to think that it is far harder to find animals or birds that are in a similar situation. This would be the equivalent of some dinosaur being found somewhere. What else is waiting to be found?

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