transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] Hey everyone, Casey here. I'm about to take off on the Year of the Cone, and I need your help. What is the Year of the Cone? Well, it's my project of finding every native species of conifer in the United States, all 111 of them, all in one year. I decided to take on this project because I wanted to tell their stories and bring attention to the incredible diversity we're lucky to have in our country. And right now, this goal seems more important than ever. The protected areas where many of these trees live are at risk of being lost. And I want to show just how important it is that we don't let that happen. And of course, you know it's going to be a lot of fun along the way. So come be a part of this project by supporting me through patreon.com/caseyclapp, joining the Cone Club at arbitrarypod.supercast.com or by giving a one-time donation at gofundme slash yearofthecone. And obviously, you can follow along on social media and YouTube so you don't miss a thing. Again, that's gofundme.com/yearofthecone or check out caseyclapp.com for more information. Thanks everyone.

Speaker 2:
[01:13] What's up, Fungal Associates? Welcome to Completely Arbortrary Tree Run, the podcast about the podcast about trees and other related topics. I'm Alex Crowson, that's Casey Clapp.

Speaker 1:
[01:21] Hi, you know what I like about this? It kind of feels like we're doing one of those reunion shows from one of the, I don't know, the Love Islands or the Survivor Islands or Big Brother Islands. Yeah, one of those, yeah, yeah. So we're all dressed up nice and we're reflecting back with sober eyes and takes.

Speaker 2:
[01:41] Well, I don't know if you remember this, Casey, but at one point we had talked about doing some sort of parody of that where we finally reveal that you and I are sort of like opposite person, like where I'm the tree expert and you are an actor playing a tree expert.

Speaker 1:
[01:56] I do remember that. Yeah, and so you're actually checking my work.

Speaker 2:
[02:00] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[02:00] I love that idea. Okay, let's try that out.

Speaker 2:
[02:02] Well, Casey, this is a tree run. This is for the Rainbow Wood episode, Trunken Steins Monster.

Speaker 1:
[02:09] The best name that I could ever hope for.

Speaker 2:
[02:13] It makes me laugh.

Speaker 1:
[02:14] It should, because it's funny.

Speaker 2:
[02:15] What did you think of this episode?

Speaker 1:
[02:17] Honestly, I loved it. I loved it for a few different reasons. One, I can hear in my voice, my little glee, my glee for what was next. And for those of you who have not heard this episode, this is going to be a little bit of a spoiler. I worked really hard to use only the past tense. And while we were recording, I recall distinctly saying something in the present tense and being like, Gah! We went back and re-recorded it. Wow. Multiple takes for multiple different things where I messed up the tense. Because I wanted it to be, when you look back, everything checked out that I was talking in the past. Because the big reveal is that the tree was ****.

Speaker 2:
[03:05] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[03:05] I was so proud of that.

Speaker 2:
[03:06] That's pretty cool.

Speaker 1:
[03:07] I'm still proud of that. I'm smiling right now thinking, good job, buddy. You did it.

Speaker 2:
[03:12] Yeah, that was fun. It was also, I mean, props to the story creator of this episode. There's also a fun thing to edit.

Speaker 1:
[03:22] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[03:22] The ending with the big reveal was silly.

Speaker 1:
[03:25] Yeah, I actually forgot that you had done that. And so go listen to it, everyone. Alex has this great, like, you can picture.

Speaker 2:
[03:31] Go listen to it. They're about to hear it.

Speaker 1:
[03:33] That's true. Oh my God. You're listening to it now. Oh my God.

Speaker 2:
[03:37] Don't go anywhere.

Speaker 1:
[03:38] Don't go anywhere. Stop. Don't touch that dial.

Speaker 2:
[03:39] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[03:40] Yeah, that ending part where you pulled it in almost like someone was thinking and realizing, oh my God, I saw it the whole time. That made me laugh so much.

Speaker 2:
[03:48] Yeah, that was good. It was also, re-listening to it, it was one of those moments where I was like, you know, in the episode, I asked you to repeat a couple things.

Speaker 1:
[03:56] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[03:57] I'm like, not quite getting something about fossilization.

Speaker 1:
[04:01] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[04:01] And listening back, I was like, he said it pretty clearly, Alex. Like, what are you struggling with? Jesus.

Speaker 1:
[04:07] Yes. This is growth, Alex.

Speaker 2:
[04:10] It must be, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[04:11] Because now you're like, dude, I understand that.

Speaker 2:
[04:14] It's clear to me now, you know, but at the time, I was like, so confused.

Speaker 1:
[04:18] It took us five years of talking to one another to actually be able to hear each other.

Speaker 2:
[04:22] Of course, they could hear, but were they listening?

Speaker 1:
[04:25] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[04:26] Wow. Well, let's go listen to that episode right now. We hope you enjoyed everybody, but before we do, Cone Club, you got to join the Cone Club, arbitrarypod.supercast.com. Here's what it is. It's a subscription service. I can see you rolling your eyes.

Speaker 1:
[04:41] No, don't do that.

Speaker 2:
[04:43] It's not like that.

Speaker 1:
[04:44] Way more fun.

Speaker 2:
[04:45] It's more like, I don't know, it's kind of like paying for the paper. You know, like you pay for the paper to show up at your door every Sunday. It's like paying us to send you stickers every month. Illustrated by cool independent artists, and those stickers are illustrations of conifer cones, flowers, leaves, bark, acorns.

Speaker 1:
[05:06] It's literally anything that has to do with the tree at this point, and it's all beautifully done.

Speaker 2:
[05:10] Yeah. And so if you want monthly stickers sent to your door with a little info card, and you want to support this podcast, which is very important also, obviously, become a Treemium member at arbortrarypod.supercast.com.

Speaker 1:
[05:22] And you know what? Don't forget, while I am out on the Year of the Cone, finding all these weird conifers across the United States, supporting the Supercast also supports me doing that and gets you all the bonus material first and foremost before anybody else the entire year I'm gone. So while you are listening to all of these episodes again, you're going to be getting a bunch of new stuff right from the road.

Speaker 2:
[05:43] That's right. Right from the road, baby. Well, we hope you enjoy this episode Rainbow Wood.

Speaker 1:
[05:50] Well, more like Rainbow Rock.

Speaker 2:
[05:53] Wow. And we'll see you on the other side. Bye, everybody.

Speaker 1:
[05:57] See you.

Speaker 2:
[06:01] Casey, I got a problem.

Speaker 1:
[06:02] What's your problem, Alex?

Speaker 2:
[06:03] All of my clothes are ratty.

Speaker 1:
[06:06] Well, you didn't need to tell me that. Oh, I'm sorry.

Speaker 2:
[06:10] I'm due for a spring reset.

Speaker 1:
[06:12] Yeah, I bet you are. Hey, have you ever thought about quince.com?

Speaker 2:
[06:16] I know quince.

Speaker 1:
[06:17] You do?

Speaker 2:
[06:18] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[06:18] This is great. Now you do too, dear listener.

Speaker 2:
[06:22] Here's how I know quince. They make high quality, everyday essentials using premium materials like 100 percent European linen and their insanely soft, flow knit athletic wear, Casey.

Speaker 1:
[06:34] Yeah. Oh, trust me, Alex. I know because guess what I'm wearing right now?

Speaker 2:
[06:38] Whoa.

Speaker 1:
[06:39] Head to toe. Well, mostly, I'm just wearing my very first, ladies and gentlemen, V-neck shirt.

Speaker 2:
[06:46] Your very first ladies and gentlemen V-neck shirt?

Speaker 1:
[06:48] This is the very first one. It turns out it took me approximately 15 years to say, no, right, I'll try it. And here I am. It's so comfortable. It's so soft. I was very stoked to get it. This is 100 percent Pima. I think that's how you say it. Cotton, which is lovely. They have so many organic options. They're paying attention to the basic wear that you need without costing you an arm and a leg. And on top of that, high quality.

Speaker 2:
[07:12] Casey, speaking of an arm and a leg, the best part of Quince is that their prices are 50 to 60 percent less than similar brands because they work directly with ethical factories and they cut out the middleman. So you're paying for quality, not brand markup.

Speaker 1:
[07:27] Yes, and I noticed that when I was going through their website, you could see what the prices would be if you bought it somewhere else versus the same thing for all intents and purposes right on quince.com. And not to mention, well, it's a tree-themed website. Yeah, obviously.

Speaker 2:
[07:40] Oh, yeah, I just realized that.

Speaker 1:
[07:43] So refresh your wardrobe with quince, everybody. Go to quince.com/trees for free shipping and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. So again, go to quince.com/trees for free shipping and 365 day returns. quince.com/trees. I love the idea of composting. I compost every possible thing I can, every moment that I can. But let me tell you, not everyone has that opportunity, Alex, and not everyone wants to deal with the smell. They may not have room in their freezer to put their compost, so it doesn't smell or something like that. It just becomes this burden for people who don't want to deal with it. I don't know what to say to them to get them to compost.

Speaker 2:
[08:31] Casey.

Speaker 1:
[08:32] What?

Speaker 2:
[08:32] I have a perfect solution. Here's what you say. Get a mill.

Speaker 1:
[08:36] That's it. Just get a mill.

Speaker 2:
[08:37] Get a mill.

Speaker 1:
[08:38] Well, what is a mill? Why do I tell them?

Speaker 2:
[08:41] Casey, I used to be one of these people.

Speaker 1:
[08:43] You used to be.

Speaker 2:
[08:43] Yeah. I live in an apartment and I did not like the idea of composting or saving my food scraps because I had nowhere to put them. And the smell, as you mentioned, is just terrible.

Speaker 1:
[08:55] It's awful. It is literally rotting food.

Speaker 2:
[08:57] But mill has solved all of my problems. It is an odorless, effortless, fully automated food recycler. You can put anything in there. I'm talking potato peels. I'm talking avocado pits. In fact, the other day, I put a big bag of chicken bones and skin.

Speaker 1:
[09:15] What?

Speaker 2:
[09:15] And it took care of it like no problem.

Speaker 1:
[09:17] That's crazy to me. And here's the other thing, Alex. It doesn't look bad. I actually had to look around your kitchen to like check to see. Like I wanted to go see it in action. Oh, yeah. I couldn't find it. And it turns out, well, I did find it. It just doesn't look like a weird machine. It's sleek. It looks nice. It's got good design and it just blends in with the rest of the whole kitchen aesthetic that you have.

Speaker 2:
[09:38] You bet it does, Casey. And it doesn't just look good. It works good. Milk can process up to 10 pounds of food scraps overnight. And it can work for weeks without you even having to empty it. In fact, I've had it for a couple of months now. I've only emptied it once.

Speaker 1:
[09:56] Wow, and you just put that in the little back patio area back here?

Speaker 2:
[09:59] Exactly. I walked down to the back garden where the dogs pee, and I dumped all of the nutrient-rich shelf stable grounds into the soil. And you're going to be thanking me come springtime.

Speaker 1:
[10:11] Yeah, I bet you I will. See, this is what I love about this kind of technology, is that it solves this modern problem and then creates a solution that then can just go right back into the earth and just become a part of our ecosystem.

Speaker 2:
[10:23] That's right, Casey, Mill makes it easy to do something good for this planet without the mess or the stress. So, Fungal Associates, we are calling on you to try Mill, risk-free, for 90 days and get $75 off at mill.com/trees and use code TREES at checkout.

Speaker 1:
[10:42] That's $75 off at mill.com/trees and use code TREES.

Speaker 2:
[10:48] That's mill.com/trees and use code TREES. Today we are talking about a tree.

Speaker 1:
[11:01] Yes, we certainly are.

Speaker 2:
[11:03] This one, boy oh boy, is this Latin name a doozy.

Speaker 1:
[11:07] Yeah, give us your best shot.

Speaker 2:
[11:08] All right. I want to say like olly olly oxen free. Aricarioxaline or Aricarioxylon. Aric... Arizonicum.

Speaker 1:
[11:20] That's right. Well done. I've also seen a Arizona... Ints, Arizona-sints, something like that.

Speaker 2:
[11:26] Arizona-n-c-a?

Speaker 1:
[11:27] Not even n-c-a, just ints, Arizona-n-ts.

Speaker 2:
[11:30] Arizona-n-ts.

Speaker 1:
[11:30] Yeah, I think that's what it is.

Speaker 2:
[11:31] It's not, Arizona-cum is very snappy.

Speaker 1:
[11:34] I like it. I like it as well. And there's something with Latin where like if the first one ends with an a, then the next one has to end with an a. It's like feminine, masculine kind of things.

Speaker 2:
[11:43] Oh, sure.

Speaker 1:
[11:44] A lot of Latin based words or languages.

Speaker 2:
[11:47] I see.

Speaker 1:
[11:47] So in this case, yeah, I have heard where like other things that end with a-chi-a with an a at the end, then it would be Arizona-c-a rather than Arizona-c-um.

Speaker 2:
[11:58] So this one's male because it ends in cum?

Speaker 1:
[12:00] I assume so, Alex. And that is why we all speak Latin.

Speaker 2:
[12:05] Oh, I couldn't resist, Casey.

Speaker 1:
[12:07] No, you can't. No one can. No one should.

Speaker 2:
[12:10] Got a few common names for this one. We're calling it the Rainbow Wood.

Speaker 1:
[12:13] Yes, exactly.

Speaker 2:
[12:14] We'll talk more about that Rainbow Wood coming up.

Speaker 1:
[12:16] Yes, we sure will.

Speaker 2:
[12:17] But Casey, let's imagine, as we do every episode, that you and I, hmm, how about this? The you and I are walking through, this is an old tree, I know that. Very, very, very, very, very, I'm not talking like grandpa old. I'm talking like caveman old. Like even before caveman old.

Speaker 1:
[12:36] Yeah, it's a cave dinosaur old.

Speaker 2:
[12:38] As we all know, cavemen walked among the dinosaurs.

Speaker 1:
[12:40] It's very true, it's a fact.

Speaker 2:
[12:41] Let's imagine that you and I, walking through a Triassic landscape, we're shitting ourselves, this place is terrifying.

Speaker 1:
[12:51] It's very scary.

Speaker 2:
[12:52] Some mosquitoes the size of a bus. Casey, let's ID this tree.

Speaker 1:
[12:59] All right, Alex, today our conifer is extremely unique.

Speaker 2:
[13:03] Conifer.

Speaker 1:
[13:04] It is a conifer. Great. It is a conifer tree, it's gorgeous. And there's nothing else quite like it around today. It's closest relatives are in the Arcariaeaceae. It is like the monkey puzzle, the Wolemia, the Norfolk Island pine.

Speaker 2:
[13:18] Wolemia.

Speaker 1:
[13:19] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[13:20] Is that Wolemi?

Speaker 1:
[13:21] That is the Wolemi pine. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[13:23] That's its Latin name?

Speaker 1:
[13:24] Yeah. I prefer calling it the Wolemia, sometimes you have to move those syllables around. Because with the pine at the end of it, I just don't like that. I'd rather call it Wolemia rather than Wolemi pine.

Speaker 2:
[13:41] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[13:41] Because it's not pine, it's like nowhere close to a pine.

Speaker 2:
[13:44] It's like Douglas fir. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[13:45] It's like an ancient, ancient tree that's nowhere near it. It's in a completely different family. It's like even more ancient than the pines. I just want to give it its own credit and use the indigenous name. So I'm going to go with it.

Speaker 2:
[13:57] Hey, fair enough.

Speaker 1:
[13:58] Okay. Those trees, all in the Aracariaaceae, the family that our rainbow wood is also in. Now, generally, you'll find all the Aracaria, Alex, down in the southern hemisphere. But our tree is actually found up in the northern hemisphere in warmer northern climes today among a bunch of other ancient conifers like Woodworthia arizonica and Shildaria adamantica.

Speaker 2:
[14:22] Shildaria.

Speaker 1:
[14:23] Yeah. Isn't that a pretty cool name?

Speaker 2:
[14:26] That definitely, you know, the moment you said that, I thought, hey, that sounds like a continent in the Elder Scrolls universe.

Speaker 1:
[14:34] Oh, yeah. Another ancient thing that you'd have to dust off and maybe find and kind of move the sand around and be like, oh my God, it's been buried in ancient for so long.

Speaker 2:
[14:43] Like it's right. Well, no, no more like it's right next to Skyrim.

Speaker 1:
[14:48] Oh, OK.

Speaker 2:
[14:49] The plains of Oblivion.

Speaker 1:
[14:51] I was thinking more like some ancient thing you'd find in a cave that was dug by the dwarfs.

Speaker 2:
[14:58] You thought I was saying actual Elder Scrolls, like old scrolls?

Speaker 1:
[15:02] Correct.

Speaker 2:
[15:02] Elder Scrolls is a video game series. Have you heard of Oblivion and Skyrim? Surely you've heard of Skyrim.

Speaker 1:
[15:08] Yes, I've heard of those.

Speaker 2:
[15:10] Those are Elder Scrolls games.

Speaker 1:
[15:11] Oh, I had no idea.

Speaker 2:
[15:13] Wow, we just had a clashing of worlds there.

Speaker 1:
[15:15] Yeah, we did.

Speaker 2:
[15:16] Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[15:16] I took what you said very literally and I shouldn't have.

Speaker 2:
[15:19] It's like a high speed accident of worlds.

Speaker 1:
[15:21] Yeah, it really was. Everyone's OK, though. We were all buckled in. So our tree developed and grew at its height around 200 million years ago.

Speaker 2:
[15:30] That's an old tree.

Speaker 1:
[15:31] It's an old tree. And this is like the late Triassic period, and it grew along the west coast of Pangea. You remember what Pangea is?

Speaker 2:
[15:39] Yeah, I like calling it Panegia, like the kid from those TikToks.

Speaker 1:
[15:45] I haven't seen this, but I love it.

Speaker 2:
[15:46] Oh, Casey, he's the best. His name is Dylan.

Speaker 1:
[15:48] What does Dylan say?

Speaker 2:
[15:49] Dylan talks about Komodo dragons and the interviewer, Recess Therapy, I think.

Speaker 1:
[15:56] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[15:57] He says, what would you say to a Komodo dragon if he said, I love you? And Dylan says, I think I would just say, thank you.

Speaker 1:
[16:05] I think I would just say, thank you.

Speaker 2:
[16:07] Dylan is so adorable.

Speaker 1:
[16:08] Wouldn't say, I love you back.

Speaker 2:
[16:10] Yeah, but he says that they lived in Panegia.

Speaker 1:
[16:12] Ah, Panegia. Okay, that's good, though.

Speaker 2:
[16:14] Which is what I call Panegia.

Speaker 1:
[16:16] In this case, yes, it was on the west coast of Panegia.

Speaker 2:
[16:18] So it grows more latinitudinally up. North is what we call that.

Speaker 1:
[16:26] Well, not quite, Alex.

Speaker 2:
[16:28] Then it's a cousin's?

Speaker 1:
[16:30] So we're talking about the height of this tree's existence.

Speaker 2:
[16:36] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[16:36] At that point, Panegia was actually centered over the equator. So it was within about 18 degrees of the equator. It was all mashed right there together. So where you can find this tree now is in warmer climes, and that is because all of the continents have switched and moved apart, and then moved up further north.

Speaker 2:
[16:57] Gotcha. So it's just going along for the ride.

Speaker 1:
[17:00] It's just going along for the ride, yeah. So way back in the Triassic, it was in these forests that were covered in tree ferns, in cycads, and early vascular and non-vascular plants. Like things that have developed... You remember when you were a kid, they're like, we had horse tails that were as tall as redwoods and things like that. Now, horse tails are like this little diminutive plant. That same kind of thing happened. There's non-vascular plants that were gigantic and huge, which today, we call club mosses, and they're just like maybe two inches tall.

Speaker 2:
[17:31] Wow.

Speaker 1:
[17:32] Yeah, pretty weird stuff. Hey, but you know what? Everyone kind of does their things. You have your triceratops back then, and now you're a chicken.

Speaker 2:
[17:43] Well.

Speaker 1:
[17:43] Evolution sometimes does funny things. Well, funny enough, there were dinosaurs that were living in this place at that time. You can imagine the earliest mammals and dinosaurs slinking around these forests. That's where these trees were growing at their absolute height. Like the Dawn Redwood kind of was, but Dawn Redwood was way higher up in latitudes at that point. They were taking those more north and more southern kind of areas.

Speaker 2:
[18:06] Okay, so speaking of at its height, let's talk about the details of this bad boy.

Speaker 1:
[18:11] All right, all right, that sounds good. So the form of this tree is the way you would expect for any other tree. The big difference is the branches are not whirled and they are not pseudo-whirled. Do you know what a whirled is in the terms that we're using?

Speaker 2:
[18:28] I guess it's sort of like, it reminds me of oppositely arranged, but in a circumference way.

Speaker 1:
[18:37] Yeah, totally.

Speaker 2:
[18:38] The branches grow alternately up the trunk in a whirled.

Speaker 1:
[18:44] Oh, you are actually right in a couple of different ways, but you're also wrong in as many different ways.

Speaker 2:
[18:50] Hey, that's going on my headstone when I die.

Speaker 1:
[18:54] Right in as many ways as he was wrong.

Speaker 2:
[18:58] That's sort of my personality, Casey. I think you just summed me up pretty good.

Speaker 1:
[19:02] You're welcome. I know you, man. I know you. Yeah, so a whirled is where you have three or more nodes or new branches coming out from the same spot. Oh, and so in a conifer, that would be where you're looking at a pine tree, let's say, and you see like this section of branches that grows out. And then there's like this foot or so of just trunk and then another section of branches, then a foot or so, then just branches. Right.

Speaker 2:
[19:33] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[19:34] So those we call them whirls, but in a very technical sense, they're pseudo whirls, where, and this is where you're right in the other way, where they are actually spiraled up the stem, but they were all set so close in that spiral that they're essentially the same spot.

Speaker 2:
[19:53] How are you spelling whirl?

Speaker 1:
[19:55] This is W-H-O-R-L.

Speaker 2:
[19:58] Oh, W-H-O. I was saying W-H-I, like whirl.

Speaker 1:
[20:03] Oh my God, I see. Okay, so.

Speaker 2:
[20:05] This is funny. This is a little who's on first situation.

Speaker 1:
[20:08] This is, this is, like Alex, it's not a whirl. It's literally a whirl, Casey. Yes, okay. Well, as our whirls collide, we will keep moving on. So if you're looking at our rainbow wood, the branches will not be coming out at these nice, easy whirls. What you'll find is that there's a branch over here, then a branch over there, then a branch over there, a branch over here, a branch over there, a branch over here, a branch over there. They're kind of randomly, irregularly distributed up the stem.

Speaker 2:
[20:40] How strange.

Speaker 1:
[20:41] So it doesn't have this very obvious pattern of growth, where you say, okay, there's a year, there's another year, there's another year. We have these things coming out, growth up, things coming out, growth up. In a pine tree, you can count from the top. And if you can see all these branches coming down in these whirls, we're just gonna say whirls, even if they're pseudo whirls, to be very clear. If you count 20, then you say, oh, that's a 20-year-old pine, or at least it's a fairly good estimate.

Speaker 2:
[21:07] Oh, okay.

Speaker 1:
[21:08] Yeah, because each year, those buds get put out left and right, and then the new shoot grows up and sets another round of buds. Then the next year, those pop and do the same thing.

Speaker 2:
[21:18] Okay, so yeah, that feels very unique in terms of the trees that we've discussed in the past, where everything seems so ordered, and we have two types of order oppositely arranged, and the other one, alternatively arranged. But this is like somebody just took branches and smooshed them on, like yeah, this should have one here.

Speaker 1:
[21:45] Exactly, as it's growing up, it's like okay, now over here, now over there, and it's just so haphazard. And you know what, Alex, it's a primitive tree, so it makes you think, yeah, there's no organization back then. It was just like put a branch on, I don't care, whatever.

Speaker 2:
[22:01] This is pre-civilization.

Speaker 1:
[22:03] This is exactly that. This is a tree that had, this is a cave tree.

Speaker 2:
[22:07] Wow. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[22:09] So that is like something that's really unique. When you're looking at the wood, you find that it has this extremely unique kind of irregularity with its crown. Now, at the end of these branches, you'll find the leaves. Imagine that the leaves are, unlike any conifer you can imagine today.

Speaker 2:
[22:26] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[22:26] Not like a pine, not like a spruce, not like a fir, more like archarias. Of course, it's in this family, right? It's named after archarias.

Speaker 2:
[22:35] So these sort of like scale-like, but like big ass scales.

Speaker 1:
[22:39] Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2:
[22:40] Dragon scales.

Speaker 1:
[22:41] You remember the cow retreat that we did, Agathis australis?

Speaker 2:
[22:44] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[22:44] Those leaves, they look like little paddles, like little ends of canoes or something like that. Yeah, yeah. Canoe paddles. It's kind of like that, where you have to imagine these trees having these weird irregular crowns with these weird paddle-shaped leaves coming out all over the place. And you'd be like, wow, that is a tree that doesn't make any sense. It looks like a tree you'd find in some diorama of what it used to look like back in the days of the dinosaur, you know what I mean?

Speaker 2:
[23:14] Right.

Speaker 1:
[23:15] These weird tree ferns and these weird leaves that are unlike anything you've ever seen.

Speaker 2:
[23:19] So Casey, this wacky ancient tree, we call it the rainbow wood.

Speaker 1:
[23:25] That's right.

Speaker 2:
[23:26] And I'm assuming that that comes from the actual colors of the wood. Hey, you know what? We also did the rainbow eucalyptus.

Speaker 1:
[23:33] Oh yes.

Speaker 2:
[23:34] We have not covered the rainbow eucalyptus.

Speaker 1:
[23:36] I was going to say, ah yes, and then say, oh wait.

Speaker 2:
[23:39] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[23:39] Right.

Speaker 2:
[23:40] Oh yes, oh wait.

Speaker 1:
[23:40] We had that immediately.

Speaker 2:
[23:42] Yes. We have not covered the rainbow eucalyptus. I think it's on our radar.

Speaker 1:
[23:45] I think it is. Oh, 100%.

Speaker 2:
[23:47] But this is not rainbow bark. This is rainbow wood.

Speaker 1:
[23:50] Exactly. Now when you find the wood of this tree, it's unlike anything you've ever seen. It has a bunch of different colors that are all based on the minerals around that tree. So sometimes it can be red. Sometimes it can be kind of pinkish white. Sometimes it can be a dark black, bluish kind of color. Sometimes it can be a little bit green, depending on if there's different chemicals in the soil around where this tree is found.

Speaker 2:
[24:17] Interesting.

Speaker 1:
[24:18] Yeah, and similar to the Dawn Redwood, you can find fossils of this and the colors are all there in the fossils.

Speaker 2:
[24:23] Wow, cool.

Speaker 1:
[24:24] Yeah, in fact, it's the fossil, state fossil of Arizona. The wood though, I should go back to this. Yeah. It is, the name of the tree is Aricaria xylon. And that is essentially Aricaria wood. The wood is of Aricaria. It looks just like it.

Speaker 2:
[24:41] Ah, okay.

Speaker 1:
[24:42] Yeah, so that's another thing you can look at and be like, wow, this wood is the same wood as all the rest of these trees that we know about, that we can find all over the place. So it's really interesting to kind of pair those things together and say, wow, I can just tell by the wood that this is a tree related to all these other trees. And so that's how it gets its name.

Speaker 2:
[25:00] Very interesting.

Speaker 1:
[25:00] Yeah, so there you go. It's the Aricaria wood tree from Arizona.

Speaker 2:
[25:04] Of the rainbow persuasion.

Speaker 1:
[25:06] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[25:06] That sounds like I'm calling it gay. That's what your uncle would call being gay.

Speaker 1:
[25:11] I was gonna say, yeah. Now, are you of the rainbow persuasion? Just asking. Como se babble, Alex?

Speaker 2:
[25:24] Casey, it's como se llama babble.

Speaker 1:
[25:27] How'd you know that, Alex?

Speaker 2:
[25:28] Well, Casey, it's quite simple, my friend. I use babble. Now, Casey, I know that learning a new language can feel overwhelming. And you're not alone. Studies show that 70 to 90% of people trying to learn a new language, they give up. But fortunately, babble is built so that it's easy to get started.

Speaker 1:
[25:46] Yeah, that's right, Alex. It's because they understand that people learn differently. So you can dive into a podcast when you don't quite feel like a quick lesson. You can speak out loud to get some practice in. You can explore different courses. They literally have it all within that one app.

Speaker 2:
[26:01] And I love that their bite-sized lessons fit easily into my daily routine. I can wake up in the morning, do a 10-minute language exercise, and I'm on my way.

Speaker 1:
[26:09] That's right, Alex. And one thing that I really appreciate is that it gives you opportunities to speak in like real-life conversations. It was a big thing when I went to Italy a few years ago. You know the words, but as soon as someone says it to you, I panicked. I was like, what do I do? Getting that kind of practice before jumping off that airplane, yeah, that's gonna help you out a lot. And Babel was so helpful for me explicitly.

Speaker 2:
[26:33] I hope you waited until it landed to jump off.

Speaker 1:
[26:36] Nope, I didn't.

Speaker 2:
[26:37] You skydove over Italy?

Speaker 1:
[26:39] Yep, right into the Mediterranean.

Speaker 2:
[26:42] However you learn best by listening, speaking, reading, writing, Babel adapts to your style and keeps you motivated with its personalized learning plans, real-time feedback, and progress tracking. Don't break that streak.

Speaker 1:
[26:54] Alex, you're right. And here is a special limited time deal just for you, our listeners, my dear, you fungal associate out there, yes, you, right now, get up to 60% off your Babel subscription at babel.com/trees. That's 60% with a six and a zero off at babel.com/trees. That's spelled babbel.com/trees.

Speaker 2:
[27:23] Rules and restrictions may apply. Should we say that in Italian? You can apply the rules and restrictions.

Speaker 1:
[27:35] I've decided no, we shouldn't.

Speaker 2:
[27:40] We're going to dive into some fossil talk here. Hopefully it doesn't bore us so much that it turns us into fossils.

Speaker 1:
[27:47] Oh my God.

Speaker 2:
[27:48] Wouldn't that be so silly?

Speaker 1:
[27:50] That's really funny.

Speaker 2:
[27:51] That would be a real Halloween miracle. Casey, let's get into some fossil talk.

Speaker 1:
[27:55] Okay, so we've talked a lot about finding trees and finding things in, say, the fossil record.

Speaker 2:
[28:01] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[28:02] So what we want to do today is our spookiness is talking about what it means to be petrified.

Speaker 2:
[28:07] Oh, okay.

Speaker 1:
[28:09] So petrified wood and the tree, of course, that we're talking about, we have found lots of it as petrified wood.

Speaker 2:
[28:17] Because it's so old.

Speaker 1:
[28:18] Exactly. We've also found so many of the Dawn Redwood in petrified form. We found fruit, we found leaves, we found everything, and it is all a fossilized version of something that either exists today or existed many, many years ago, and we just find it in these rocks.

Speaker 2:
[28:36] Right. So we talked about ginkgoes and Dawn Redwoods being living fossils, because they exist today.

Speaker 1:
[28:44] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[28:44] And we have fossilized records of them.

Speaker 1:
[28:49] Yeah, so we know how old they are as a species.

Speaker 2:
[28:52] So this this rainbow wood is sort of like that.

Speaker 1:
[28:55] Exactly. Exactly. Sort of.

Speaker 2:
[28:57] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[28:57] Now, the process of petrification or petrifaction is pretty interesting. I know I learned that there's a term for it, but everyone just says petrification rather than petrifaction.

Speaker 2:
[29:10] Petrifaction is correct?

Speaker 1:
[29:11] Yeah, I think so. I think they're both correct, because I think one's used so often where everyone's like, yeah, that's the same thing. We're just going to make it another word for it.

Speaker 2:
[29:19] Got it.

Speaker 1:
[29:20] So, there's a couple different kinds of fossils, and there are, in the broadest sense, a fossil is just evidence of a living thing in rocks.

Speaker 2:
[29:32] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[29:33] And the big thing that I want to talk about today is petrified wood specifically. Now, petrified wood is, you are walking down in the desert somewhere, say in Arizona, you find this weird looking rock, and you pick it up, and it's really heavy, like, kind of like super heavy for the size, and you're like, why is it so heavy and so dense? And you look at it, and it looks just like a piece of wood. It's got the same lines of grain. If you look at the top, you can see the growth rings. You look on the outside, you can see what looks like crack in the wood. Sometimes you can even find bark, actually, what looks like bark. But then you knock on it with your hand, and you're just like, this is a rock. That is petrified wood. It is no longer wood, but it is exactly a model of what wood looked like in situ millions and millions of years ago.

Speaker 2:
[30:31] It's like a molded, it's like a mold.

Speaker 1:
[30:33] Well, so it's not quite. That's another kind of fossil. Let's talk about that one first, though.

Speaker 2:
[30:40] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[30:40] So if you are a leaf from an oak tree, you flutter around, you land on the surface of some water. Over time, you sink, that oak leaf sinks to the bottom, and then another one sinks, and another one does it, and you have this happen literally millions of times over millions of years. You get sediment growing and coming in on top of that, so you get little bits of sand and dust and soil and all these things, and they kind of pile up on top of each other for, again, millions and millions of years. Maybe this water completely dries up and goes away, then other things blow in over the top of it, and you get this mud thing, and you get a little bit of other stuff, and then tectonic plates, and then, now you have this gigantic compressed section of leaves and organic material and mud. It used to be, say, 20 feet thick. It gets compressed all the way down to like two inches thick. This happens over millions of years, millions of times, and you get these gigantic layers of stuff.

Speaker 2:
[31:41] Is that like, I think I know the answer to this question. It's yes, but like when you go to like, you know, Arizona, come, or like Utah, you see like the lines of color in the rocks?

Speaker 1:
[31:53] Exactly, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[31:54] That's what those are, right?

Speaker 1:
[31:55] Precisely, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[31:55] They're like tree growth rings in the soil, in the earth.

Speaker 1:
[31:58] Yeah, but those are geologic layers, where one is a sedimentary kind of rock, like let's say it's ash comes down, then a bunch of other stuff grows on top of that, maybe it becomes fertile for a second, you get this big layer of something else, mud. You know, you name it, it's just layers upon layers of different rocks deposited in some way that then get compressed and pushed into another kind of rock. So this geologic layering, these things that you can see, sometimes they happen in a situation where plant matter or other living kinds of things get into there. So like our leaf example we were just using, if those leaves are pressed and pushed together and then you add a little bit of heat, you add a little bit of pressure, maybe add a little bit of water seeping through over very, very slowly over millions of years, you end up having a mold of that leaf where all the organic material essentially gets broken down into nothing and kind of gets leached and washed away. But the space that it took up remains in the rock, that pressed leaf formation.

Speaker 2:
[33:04] Oh.

Speaker 1:
[33:04] Then other stuff comes on top of it, and then if you come with a little hammer, you knock into it, you break apart those layers, you can find those impressions of the leaves. That impression is a fossil of that leaf.

Speaker 2:
[33:19] Oh, so it's not like the thing inside the impression is the fossil, it is the impression itself.

Speaker 1:
[33:24] Yes, exactly.

Speaker 2:
[33:25] My hand print in the sand is a fossil.

Speaker 1:
[33:29] Correct.

Speaker 2:
[33:30] My hand is not the fossil.

Speaker 1:
[33:31] Exactly. Now, if your hand was cut off, we laid it in there, we then put another layer on top of it, and we did more layers and more layers, and then your hand over time gets each individual cell replaced with a molecule of, say, silica, and that happens to every single entire thing. Your hand is no longer there. It's been replaced like Theseus' ship. One plank, one cell at a time. And then, if we at some point wisp everything away, we can find the impression of your hand that now has been completely petrified by a different substance entirely.

Speaker 2:
[34:12] So what do you call that substance? That's not a fossil, right?

Speaker 1:
[34:15] No, that would be silica. That's rock.

Speaker 2:
[34:17] So that's not considered a fossil?

Speaker 1:
[34:19] It is. That's a fossil, but that is a petrification process.

Speaker 2:
[34:22] So that's what happens to wood.

Speaker 1:
[34:23] Exactly. So let's rewind for a second. If you have an impression...

Speaker 2:
[34:28] I knew this was going to be a challenge for you. I'm so sorry, Casey.

Speaker 1:
[34:31] Oh, Alex, this is great. I think we've gotten way further than your geology teacher. Okay, okay, we're going to rewind real fast. The main types of petrification and fossilization are like this, petrified fossils, mold fossils, cast fossils, trace fossils, body fossils, carbon films and true form fossils.

Speaker 2:
[34:55] It all went straight in one ear and out the other.

Speaker 1:
[34:58] Great, we're only going to talk about the first few.

Speaker 2:
[35:02] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[35:03] So a mold is where you have something that is, it falls into the bottom of the ocean, gets covered with sediment, and then that thing itself goes away. For whatever reason, maybe it just over millions of years dissolves and then gets washed away. Then if you uncover it millions of years later, you have this mold of what used to be there. That would be, you put your hand into a place, and then when you uncover it, your hand is no longer there. It's gone away, but the mold of where your hand used to be is still there. That would be a mold fossil.

Speaker 2:
[35:39] So that's the type where you have to break it open to see the fossil, right? People will break open rocks and be like, oh, there's a trilobite.

Speaker 1:
[35:46] Exactly, yeah. That is usually a mold fossil. And that's like the famous ones you see when you see a petrified leaf or stem of flower. That is a mold fossil.

Speaker 2:
[35:55] Got it.

Speaker 1:
[35:56] Now, if you do that exact same process, but instead that mold gets filled with something, then that's a cast fossil. And you just imagine this, if you make a mold of something, if you pour some plaster into it, then you get a cast from that mold. That's the exact same processes. So they're very closely related. But one is the what's leftover from what used to be there. The other is the impression of what used to be there based on that first mold.

Speaker 2:
[36:23] And in that latter situation, the cast is the fossil.

Speaker 1:
[36:29] Yes, correct. Now, petrification is a little bit different than both of those. It's like what we were talking about if we cut your hand off and put it into a thing. Which you could probably call that-

Speaker 2:
[36:39] I don't know this analogy.

Speaker 1:
[36:40] Yeah, we're gonna change it. We'll change it and we'll use, how about we use wood as an analogy?

Speaker 2:
[36:45] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[36:47] So that would be a body fossil if we cut your hand off. Probably all your skin would go away and it would just be your bones left over.

Speaker 2:
[36:52] Enough.

Speaker 1:
[36:52] Yeah. Sorry, Alex. Sorry. Anyway, this is too spooky for you.

Speaker 2:
[36:55] I guess this is our Halloween episode. We need to get spooky.

Speaker 1:
[36:57] But you just said you don't like Halloween, so I think it's fair that you're like, stop.

Speaker 2:
[37:00] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[37:02] Okay, we're gonna keep going, but we're gonna talk about wood now, Alex.

Speaker 2:
[37:05] All right.

Speaker 1:
[37:06] Okay. I got you on board. This isn't scary.

Speaker 2:
[37:08] This is wood.

Speaker 1:
[37:09] You can open your eyes. Ah, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[37:12] Well, Casey's wearing a Frankenstein mask.

Speaker 1:
[37:14] It's Trunkenstein, Alex. So a petrified fossil is where you have wood. Let's say it is a part of our tree that we're talking about today. Yes. Arecaria xylon, Arizona come. And that tree is growing. It's having a great time. Then all of a sudden a bunch of insects bore into it and kill it. It then falls over in some huge rainstorm. It hits this gigantic flowing river that's swelled up because this is such a huge rainstorm in this Pangea area where there's this gigantic, the single largest river in the history of rivers on Earth. And it's flowing northwest. Finally, it hits this little area and it deposits a bunch of these old logs. Those logs probably got completely ripped apart. Some bits were broken here. The roots were kind of ripped off. There's no bark left onto it and it kind of got sheared off because it just hit all these rocks on the way and all these things. It lands in this area and it sinks to the bottom of this pond. A volcano erupts. 20,000 volcanoes erupt. They cover this whole place with ash. The ash slowly seeps down and it's very acidic. And so it ends up creating a space that has no oxygen in it. Again, you're underwater, so there's no oxygen really anyway. But now you have even less oxygen because there's no water even to speak of. Because the ash has completely covered up everything. Now you're just a log in a big piece of sediment.

Speaker 2:
[38:43] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[38:44] That's our scene.

Speaker 2:
[38:45] Can I repeat that back to you?

Speaker 1:
[38:47] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[38:47] I am a piece of wood. I'm still wood.

Speaker 1:
[38:49] Yep.

Speaker 2:
[38:51] And I'm bare.

Speaker 1:
[38:52] Hold on. We want to take this completely away from you. You're not wood. You're just watching this happen.

Speaker 2:
[38:56] Come on, I want to be wood.

Speaker 1:
[38:57] You said you didn't want it to be your body.

Speaker 3:
[38:59] No, I don't want my hand chopped off over and over.

Speaker 1:
[39:02] Okay.

Speaker 2:
[39:02] But I want to be wood.

Speaker 1:
[39:03] All right, Alex, you can be wood for Halloween.

Speaker 2:
[39:06] I proposed putting my hand in the sand like a child might. You were the one who proposed chopping it off and leaving it there. Well, I...

Speaker 1:
[39:15] All right, moving on.

Speaker 2:
[39:17] I'm a piece of wood. And I'm at the bottom of a river, and a million volcanoes blew up, and I'm covered in ash, and it's very... It's compacted down. So on one side of me, I have a bunch of sand, and on one side of me, I have a bunch of ash, and I'm being squeezed.

Speaker 1:
[39:36] Sure, yeah, yeah, exactly. And I think the what's on one side versus the other, not really super important.

Speaker 2:
[39:41] Okay, not a detail I needed to add.

Speaker 1:
[39:43] No, but it's totally fine. You just have all the sediment.

Speaker 2:
[39:45] Yes, I'm covered in sediment. It's crushing me.

Speaker 1:
[39:48] Yes, exactly. Now, you're strong enough that you're not getting crushed and compressed. It's also, there's not so much like big rocks and tectonic movements that you're actually getting compressed. That would end up turning you probably closer into a fossil like a fossilized leaf, where it's completely compressed between two layers. In this case, you're just down there. You're just hanging out. There's all this stuff around you, but you are strong enough that you're just like holding your own space around you or holding your own space internally.

Speaker 2:
[40:18] Oh, sure. Wood's a lot harder than leaf.

Speaker 1:
[40:20] Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 2:
[40:21] Hey, take, put that on a T-shirt. Yeah, wood's a lot harder than leaf.

Speaker 1:
[40:26] People would love that. I love that. So over the next several million years, you remain there. And when I say several, I mean approximately 220 million years.

Speaker 2:
[40:39] Woof.

Speaker 1:
[40:40] You're just chilling there.

Speaker 2:
[40:41] Do I have a book at least?

Speaker 1:
[40:43] So what happens is slowly but surely, water sinks through and dissolves some of the silica that's in this area. So it seeps through and it saturates every single tiny space inside and around your cells. All those cells will die, but wood, of course, is very strong. So even when it's dead, it maintains its shape. All of this water slowly fills in the spaces between each individual cell.

Speaker 2:
[41:12] Wow.

Speaker 1:
[41:13] Then it fills as those cells kind of dissolve and degrade and become essentially nothing. They are filled themselves. But in situ, so the actual cell wall of that plant, that plant part, this wood, xylem, will get filled up with a molecule of silica, or another very closely related kind of molecule that's dissolved in the water.

Speaker 2:
[41:37] So the cell walls remain.

Speaker 1:
[41:39] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[41:39] But the cell contents...

Speaker 1:
[41:41] Well, the cell walls, everything, all the organic matter goes away.

Speaker 2:
[41:47] But is replaced with silica.

Speaker 1:
[41:49] Yes, with individual molecules that all get crystallized. And then over these 220 million years, every single organic piece of you, the log, is replaced with an actual piece of molecule of a real rock, essentially, silica. And that happens to every single bit, and then you are now just this individual, not log. Now, you are a rock. And that rock is petrified wood. It's no longer wood. It is all these bits and parts placed exactly where the wood used to be, so it can keep an amazing amount of detail. There are some that even keep the cellular, like, details intact. So you can go back, and you can say, wow, this tree is a part of the Arcariaceae. I can tell because the wood is exactly like the wood of the Arcariaceae, and I can see it to that detail.

Speaker 2:
[42:51] Okay, because it's going molecule by molecule.

Speaker 1:
[42:54] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[42:54] That's why you get that detail.

Speaker 1:
[42:56] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[42:57] It's like pointillism.

Speaker 1:
[42:58] Yeah, and you can look at little slabs of petrified wood that they've cut off and looked under microscopes, and you would think you're looking at a piece of a small slab of wood that you cut off.

Speaker 2:
[43:09] Right.

Speaker 1:
[43:09] It's amazing.

Speaker 2:
[43:10] Interesting.

Speaker 1:
[43:11] And that is what happens. And then you get colors because different chemicals come in and they add different colors. So quartz is the thing that happens once silica kind of crystallizes. So you get these really shiny, like, crystallized logs, and you're like, oh my gosh, this is a log, but it used to be... No, it is. Is it a log? Is it rock? You don't know. Are you familiar now with the petrification process?

Speaker 2:
[43:36] Yes. I believe I understand the petrification process.

Speaker 1:
[43:39] All right. Good. The only last thing to add.

Speaker 2:
[43:41] Except I'm going to call it petrifaction because I want to be different.

Speaker 1:
[43:44] Thank you. I appreciate that. I think that's more appropriate and I think there's some geologists who's like, oh, thank you. Thank God. So the big thing that the only other thing to add is that for this to happen, all of these bits and parts need to be in an oxygen-less environment.

Speaker 2:
[44:00] Okay. Why is that?

Speaker 1:
[44:02] Because oxygen is what things use to respire. So anything that lives and breathes would attack that wood, colonize it and eat it. So just like all the decomposers we have today, they would all just go nom, nom, nom, nom, just eat any organic matter that's there.

Speaker 2:
[44:18] Right.

Speaker 1:
[44:18] So it has to be in a oxygen-free environment. That way nothing eats it and it just kind of sits there inert where there's no bacteria, there's no fungus, there's nothing that's eating it.

Speaker 2:
[44:31] That's why the mummification process is so effective because you put it down there with all the salt and sand, there's no air, right?

Speaker 1:
[44:40] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[44:41] Maybe the salt kills bacteria.

Speaker 1:
[44:43] Yeah, a little bit. There's also bacteria that totally love salt kind of things, but it's mostly the oxygen that, if you are in a place that lacks any oxygen, then that really is the thing that does it. It's like pickling. It keeps things in situ for a really long time because the stuff that would degrade it doesn't live there.

Speaker 2:
[45:02] I see. Well, Casey.

Speaker 1:
[45:05] There you have it.

Speaker 2:
[45:06] Oh, hey, I just thought of something. Before we move on to our review of the Rainbow Wood. Yeah. You mentioned up top that this is a conifer.

Speaker 1:
[45:16] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[45:17] But we neglected to talk about the cone.

Speaker 1:
[45:22] Oh, yeah, of course.

Speaker 2:
[45:24] Should we do that now?

Speaker 1:
[45:26] Alex, what do you mean? We can't.

Speaker 2:
[45:28] Why, Casey?

Speaker 1:
[45:29] Well, no one knows what it looks like, Alex.

Speaker 2:
[45:31] But doesn't it grow a cone?

Speaker 1:
[45:33] Well, yeah, all conifers grow cones.

Speaker 2:
[45:35] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[45:36] But we've never found the cone of this conifer.

Speaker 2:
[45:38] Why have we never found the cone of this conifer?

Speaker 1:
[45:42] Alex, aren't you aware? This tree has been dead for millions of years. So our tree developed and grew at its height around 200 million years ago.

Speaker 2:
[45:56] That's an old tree.

Speaker 1:
[45:58] There are fossils of it all over the place.

Speaker 2:
[46:02] We talked about ginkgoes and non-redwoods being living fossils because they exist today.

Speaker 1:
[46:07] Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[46:08] So this rainbow wood is sort of like that.

Speaker 1:
[46:11] Exactly. Exactly. Sort of. Sort of. Sort of.

Speaker 2:
[46:18] What a twist!

Speaker 1:
[46:19] Oh my god! Alex, you had no idea. I know. The listeners out there, did you not know either?

Speaker 2:
[46:26] We should have an ad in our mid-roll for M. Night Shyamalan.

Speaker 1:
[46:32] I would love that.

Speaker 2:
[46:34] It's officially sponsored by him.

Speaker 1:
[46:35] Alex, I can't believe we neglected to say this earlier.

Speaker 2:
[46:39] Yeah, right.

Speaker 1:
[46:41] This tree has been dead for millions of years. The only reason you can find it in Arizona today is because it is littered in its petrified form across Petrified National Forest National Park.

Speaker 2:
[46:56] What a fantastic reveal, Casey.

Speaker 1:
[46:59] It's not the name of that national park.

Speaker 2:
[47:00] You're fine. What a reveal. This tree has been dead the whole time.

Speaker 1:
[47:06] It's been dead the whole time, Alex. Wow. We've never found the cone. We don't exactly know what the leaves look like because this process of it being washed away that we imagined is exactly what everyone thinks happened. So all of the small bits and parts have decayed away. Only those big logs that sunk down to the bottom. Those are the only things that are left to find now. No other sediment from what used to be there, what was also deposited potentially in this area, none of it's been found.

Speaker 2:
[47:38] That's right, Casey. The story of this petrified wood we've been telling of this ancient tree that no longer exists, is the story of this week's tree, the rainbow wood.

Speaker 1:
[47:48] That's exactly right, Alex.

Speaker 2:
[47:50] Should we also say, we called the rainbow wood because the petrification process of this wood imbued it with all sorts of beautiful colors.

Speaker 1:
[48:01] I think we could say that, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[48:03] So rainbow wood is what the petrified wood is called.

Speaker 1:
[48:06] So it really should be rainbow rock.

Speaker 2:
[48:09] That's a good point. But it is not an official common name because this has no official common name.

Speaker 1:
[48:16] In fact, Alex, I'm happy you brought that up. There is, in fact, not even an actual tree called Aricaria xylon arizonicum. This is a ghost of many trees.

Speaker 2:
[48:28] This is the name of the fossil?

Speaker 1:
[48:30] This is the name of the fossil. But there are maybe up to 16 or 20 different species of tree that they've found. But remember, we're only looking at the wood. So there are some that we are really easily able to tell apart. Woolworthia arizonica and Shildaria adamantica, we can say, oh yeah, that's that one, that's that one. But the actual Aracario xylon arizonicum doesn't exist. It's not a real tree. Most of these are actually other trees and they call them other things like Palixavaxilon dodorii, Palixavaxilon arizonicum, and Chinlarexilon noltania.

Speaker 2:
[49:15] I love the idea of you speaking Latin, but with your American accent.

Speaker 1:
[49:20] Yeah, it's really hard.

Speaker 2:
[49:21] It's really fun to listen to.

Speaker 1:
[49:22] Like Casey, he has no idea what he's saying. These are three other scientific names that are extremely hard to pronounce.

Speaker 2:
[49:29] Yes, geez.

Speaker 1:
[49:30] That are of other species that are different. Basically, there's no one Aricaria xylon arizona come. There's probably a bunch of other trees, but because we can't find any necessary means of identifying species of fossils, because you could just be seeing something that is different than everything else, but we don't know that that's one species. It could be like the other Aricarias. All the wood is exactly the same. So if you find the wood of 16 different species, you just know that they look all exactly the same. Maybe they're one species, maybe they're 16, maybe they're 20.

Speaker 2:
[50:06] Interesting.

Speaker 1:
[50:07] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[50:08] Chills. Whoa, what a great episode.

Speaker 1:
[50:13] I did not see that coming. It was the whole time.

Speaker 2:
[50:17] The whole time. As Sally Field says in Mrs. Doubtfire, the whole time, the whole time.

Speaker 1:
[50:24] And then they fall back in love.

Speaker 2:
[50:27] I don't think that's how that movie ends.

Speaker 1:
[50:28] No, I don't think it is.

Speaker 2:
[50:29] I think he just gets his visitation rights.

Speaker 1:
[50:32] That's all.

Speaker 2:
[50:33] I always forget what a big part of that movie, this court case is.

Speaker 1:
[50:38] Yeah, that's true. And like, it's very, it's an intense court case.

Speaker 2:
[50:40] It's actually quite touching. Robin Williams is incredible.

Speaker 1:
[50:43] Absolutely, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[50:44] He could do it all.

Speaker 1:
[50:45] And the whole premise is that he's just dressing up as a nanny and being all super silly.

Speaker 2:
[50:49] Yeah, he wants to be in his kid's life. I love how much he loves his kids.

Speaker 1:
[50:53] He's really beautiful.

Speaker 2:
[50:54] Oh, it's so good, RIP. I forgot, while we were recording the intro to this episode, I forgot that I have a piece of rainbow wood sitting up on my shelf.

Speaker 1:
[51:04] Right there. I got that from a shop down in Arizona and brought it back.

Speaker 2:
[51:08] I have a question. How much did that cost?

Speaker 1:
[51:10] Honestly, I have no clue. I cannot remember at this point.

Speaker 2:
[51:13] I guess I was just wondering how people are monetizing this kind of thing down there.

Speaker 1:
[51:19] Yeah, I don't.

Speaker 2:
[51:19] Why is it so hard for me to say?

Speaker 1:
[51:21] I don't know. Yeah, well, you're really worried about it. Yeah, I have no idea. I don't remember at all. That was on the trip that I took with an ex-girlfriend of mine, Hannah, which is fun listening back to these episodes. It was the very first two years we were dating, so there's a lot of references to her in there.

Speaker 2:
[51:37] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[51:38] Yeah, this was on our very first big road trip, the one that actually truly inspired the road trip that I am on right now. Because we did this little trip and I was like, what if we do this next year, but just do the West? Then that has transitioned into me staying away for a whole year doing the entire country.

Speaker 2:
[51:53] How about that?

Speaker 1:
[51:54] Isn't that fun?

Speaker 2:
[51:55] Well, Casey, what a great episode. And we got another great one.

Speaker 1:
[51:58] Yeah, we sure do.

Speaker 2:
[51:59] Coming up next week. You want to tell the people what it is?

Speaker 1:
[52:01] Yeah, I do. It's sticky, sweet, sometimes sugary, sometimes a little boozy. Cacao. Cacao. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[52:09] And we will see you at Cacao.

Speaker 1:
[52:12] That's right. Remember, follow along on the Year of the Cone and go join that Cone Club. Go get it. Go get those cool stickers.

Speaker 2:
[52:19] arbortrarypod.supercast.com. With that, we say, bye. Completely Arbortrary Tree Runs, hell, that's produced by Alex Crowson and Casey Clapp.

Speaker 1:
[52:34] That's right, and our artwork is by Jillian Barthold.

Speaker 2:
[52:37] And that music, it's by Aves and the Minivandals.

Speaker 1:
[52:40] And remember, the best way to support this podcast, become a Treemium member at arbortrarypod.supercast.com.

Speaker 4:
[52:51] Hey, I'm Jim Deerogatis.

Speaker 5:
[52:53] And I'm Gregg Codd.

Speaker 4:
[52:54] And our show, Sound Opinions, is about exploring music today, giving trends an historical perspective.

Speaker 5:
[53:00] And being blown away by what's brand new to the scene.

Speaker 4:
[53:04] The disco backlash had been kind of accumulating before disco demolition. Oh, disco demolition comes late.

Speaker 5:
[53:10] We've spent more than 20 years dissecting the latest in music, interviewing artists, and sharing some of our under-the-radar favorites.

Speaker 4:
[53:17] We know a lot about music, but each week we're still learning from the musical legends, innovators that look at music a bit differently, and other music journalists.

Speaker 5:
[53:25] Mary Clayton singing her iconic part on the Rolling Stones song, Gimme Shelter. I mean, holy mackerel.

Speaker 4:
[53:33] It leaves even us speechless.

Speaker 5:
[53:35] They chill down the spine every time I hear that. Most importantly, we learn from you, because at Sound Opinions, everyone can let out their inner critic in our community.

Speaker 3:
[53:44] I'm calling about your show. I enjoyed your show about Carole King, but I also wanted to chime in.

Speaker 4:
[53:50] So join us each week from your favorite place to listen to shows. We'll be there.

Speaker 6:
[53:54] Hi, I am Mandy Moore.

Speaker 7:
[53:56] Sterling K.

Speaker 4:
[53:57] Brown.

Speaker 7:
[53:57] And I'm Chris Sullivan. And we host the podcast That Was Us, now on Headgum.

Speaker 6:
[54:02] Each episode, we're going to go into a deep dive from our show This Is Us.

Speaker 4:
[54:06] That's right.

Speaker 6:
[54:06] We're going to go episode by episode. We're also going to pepper in episodes with different guest stars, and writers, and casting directors.

Speaker 7:
[54:15] Yeah.

Speaker 5:
[54:15] Are we going to cry?

Speaker 7:
[54:16] Yes, a little bit.

Speaker 5:
[54:17] Are we going to laugh?

Speaker 7:
[54:18] A lot.

Speaker 4:
[54:19] A whole lot.

Speaker 7:
[54:19] That's what I'm hoping, man. Listen to That Was Us on your favorite podcast app, or watch full video episodes on YouTube or Spotify. New episodes every Tuesday.