Study: Large old trees grow fastest, storing more carbon

Trees do not slow in their growth rate as they get older and larger. Instead, their growth keeps accelerating, according to research at the USGS Western Ecological Research Center USA. Growth measurements were compiled of 673,046 trees belonging to 403 tree species across six continents, calculating the mass growth rates for each species and then analyzing for trends.
The results showed that for most tree species, mass growth rate increases continuously with tree size and in some cases, large trees appear to be adding the carbon mass equivalent of an entire smaller tree each year. An article about the study is published in Nature (Press Release USGS, 15 January 2014).
Click here for the press release.
Click here for the article about the study (1.68 MB).

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