“…a giant sequoia in Sequoia National Park, is the largest tree in the world by volume”– Fun Facts
Young Giant Sequoia, Sequoiadendron giganteum (Dcrjsr, 2010)
Giant Sequoia was first described as Wellingtonia gigantea by John Lindley (1853), named for the Duke of Wellington in the United Kingdom where it was introduced in 1853. Later, the species was placed in its own genus Sequoiadendron by Buchholz (1939). Since then, two other extinct species described from fossils have been added to the genus, Sequoiadendron chaneyi (Axelrod, 1956) and Sequoiadendron tchucoticum (Sokolva & Moiseeva, 2016).
Sequoiadendron giganteum can occasionally be mistaken in its younger form for the genus Juniperus, with similarly scale-like, pleated foliage, but is much more tree-like than the shrub-shaped junipers, and is distinguished by its hard, woody cones, as opposed to fleshy berry-like cones that are characteristic to Junipers. Sequoiadendron giganteum can be easily distinguished from other redwoods by its foliage, with closed, scale-like leaves, as opposed to the elongated, blade-shaped leaves of other redwoods (Redwoodworld, 2024).
Sequoiadendron giganteum individuals are incredibly long-lived, living for thousands of years, and are among some of the largest living organisms (by individual size).
General Sherman, a giant sequoia in Sequoia National Park, is the largest tree in the world by volume and is estimated to be between 2150 and 3200 years old (Stephenson, 2000).
Native
Introduced
Sequoiadendron giganteum is listed as Endangered by the IUCN Red List (Schmid & Farjon, 2013), with as few as 80,000 individuals left alive in about 20 populations.
