| The Coastal Redwoods of Northern California are a direct link back in time one hundred thirty million years positively identified Redwoods fossils take the tree back to upper jurassic period. From that far back many different plants have come and gone, but the Redwoods (Sequoia Sempervirens) have survived twenty five million years ago the Redwood trees stretched across the Northern hemisphere from Western Canada to the Atlantic from France to Japan. In the United States fossils have been found in Texas,Pennsylvania,Colorado,Wyoming,Oregon,Washington,California. Redwood fossils have been found in Spitzbergen,Greenland even as far North as Alaska over millions of years the climate has grown colder and drier. The Redwoods began to retreat leaving this cold enviroment for more suitable areas even in Europe the Redwood tree started out in England,France,Germany,Bohemia,Austria and Switzerland, but the driving glaciers moved the Redwoods back to the Mediterranean Sea unable to cross over to Africa the tree perished. In Asia the story was thought to be the same until 1944 when in a remote village located in Szechuan province in Central China a traveler marveled at a unique tree of very large stature. Samples matched the fossil remains of Metasequoia tree. This tree thought to be dead for twenty five million years was alive in a large forest of hundreds of trees in the isolated region of Szechvan and Hupert provinces here where the conditions of temperature and humidity were just right. This tree once reigned from the Black Sea to Greenland has made it's last stand. In America the Redwood empire shrank the southward march of the glaciers great volcanic eruptions and the upthurst of mountain ranges singly and collectively undid the work of one hundred million years. As the Redwood empire shrank so did the number of their species. In time just two were left. It just so happens California is the State that the last two made their last bid for survival. The big tree Sequoia Gingantea is standing in isolated groves. In the Southern Sierra Nevada mountain range and the Redwoods,Sequoias,Sempervirens occupying a narrow strip along the Northern California Coast are the last represenatives of a heroic race, the last of the true Sequoias a living link to the age of Dinosuars thats why this house is truely a home in the heart of the Redwoods. |
