The Fortingall yew, located in a cemetery in that town, in the Scottish region of Perthshire, is the oldest tree in the United Kingdom and one of the oldest in Europe – it is estimated to be between 3,000 and 5,000 years old. It is a specimen of considerable size. In a 1769 writing it was already mentioned that its trunk was about 17 meters in circumference , although at present it has several stems and its appearance more closely resembles a group of several trees. But it is not its size or its age that has recently caught the attention of experts.
Although in historical records it has always been considered male – males have characteristic spherical structures that release pollen when they mature – it has begun to bear berries in a small area of its crown, which suggests that at least part of it is changing sex . It is true that many tree species are made up of female and male parts, but yews are usually male or female.
The first to notice the change was Max Coleman, from the Royal Botanic Gardens in Edinburgh, who assures that this phenomenon occurs rarely. The transformation occurs thanks to a change in the hormonal balance that controls the production of your reproductive organs. Some researchers believe that this phenomenon could have originated as an adaptation to a sudden change in environmental conditions, as a consequence, for example, of a particularly intense drought.
Image: Mogens Engelund via Wikimedia / CC
