- I'm driving through
the redwoods the morning after the big snowstorm,
and it's pretty gnarly. Just down trees, fallen
branches all over the road. I know it's normal for trees to fall over and branches to fall out of trees, but with a 300 foot tall
monster tree like these, the consequences are, you know, magnified a bit. There are secrets hidden in this forest, trees taller than any others on earth, older than the Roman Empire, so large that their canopies
support entire ecosystems, kept secrets so that
they won't be destroyed. Check this out, the Grinnell Creek giant. If this tree were still standing today, it'd be the largest on earth. But it was cut down in 1926 along with the most of this forest. This forest is just 4% of
what was here 200 years ago, and lately, it's been facing a new threat. Because as it turns out, being the tallest tree is not a blessing. It's actually a curse. I wanna tell you how these
trees got so damn big and how it's putting them in danger. It's a story about how
gigantic our planet is but also how much smaller
the internet makes it. (water whooshing) (soft music) We're driving down the
Oregon Coast Highway to a place called the Fog Belt, a thin band of coastline
in Northern California and Southern Oregon with a
mild climate, tons of rain, and this ever-present coastal fog, prime conditions that allow for the growth of ginormous trees. Day 1 in the redwoods,
as soon as we got here, got hit by a big winter storm. It's been snowin' a
ton, and it's gorgeous, but that does also mean that
a lot of the access roads to get to the big redwood
groves and trails are closed. But they're not closed
because of the snow, they're closed because a
storm can blow down a tree, and these trees are just so
damn big, that if that happens, it can be a real problem. It can completely block off roads and trap people in these parks. Yeah, that kinda gives you an idea of the the size of tree
we're working with here. Ridiculous. The coast redwoods that grow here are the tallest trees on earth. The tallest are between 350 and 380 feet. The largest are over 25 feet in diameter, and the oldest are over 3,000 years old. These are believed to
be the largest organism to ever appear on earth. Fossilized seeds of
trees similar to redwoods have been found in places
as remote as Antarctica. Meaning, they are likely older
than the first dinosaurs, and at one point, covered
much of the earth. These trees can grow in
places with almost no light, and they're fire resistant. Redwoods burn pretty
frequently, but they keep going. You can find scars in the bark and the hollowed out fire
caves within the trees. These trees are so large and complex that their canopies
support entire ecosystems hundreds of feet off the ground. Hanging gardens of ferns, rhododendrons, elderberry bushes, earthworms, tiny aquatic creatures, salamanders. Other trees even grow in the trees. Douglas firs, western
hemlock, Sitka spruce, even small redwoods have
been found growing high in the canopy. And many of the species living here are scientifically unidentified. When a redwood tree does eventually die, it spits out a collection of seeds, creating this perfect circle of new trees called a fairy ring. They look really cool. And the roots of all of these trees spread out and intertwine. So in a sense, this entire
forest is connected. I'm starting to realize the dilemma of making a video out here is that no image could
ever possibly convey how huge these trees are. All right, so these trees are gigantic, which sounds like a natural strength, but it's actually been
more of a fatal flaw and has kinda led to these trees' demise. In the mid-1800s, the Gold Rush brought hundreds of thousands
of people to California. Logging accelerated rapidly,
and over the next century, the majority of California's
old-growth redwood forest was bought up by timber
companies and harvested largely in clearcuts and specifically
targeting the largest trees. The fact that any of these
trees are still standing is actually thanks to a pretty
small handful of activists. In 1918, a group of wealthy donors founded the Save-the-Redwoods League using their gigantic pile of cash to buy up 170,000 acres
of old-growth forest and then just hold onto it and protect it. Fast forward in 1963 and the
head of National Geographic thinks the redwood should
be a national park. So he sends an expedition
into these logging forests to find a really tall tree and make a case for protecting it. And it works. They find this 367 foot tall tree, the tallest ever recorded at the time. National Geographic describes it as the Mount Everest of all living things, and a few years later, the
National Park is established with this tree right in the middle. Fast forward a bit more to the 1970s, and there are plans to expand the park. Logging companies catch wind
of this and start cutting down as much of the area around
the park as possible. By the time the park expanded in 1978, 80% of the new land had
already been logged. But the expansion still
included 9,000 acres of old-growth forest tucked
away in these deep canyons that timber companies couldn't get to. What no one knew at the time
is that those 9,000 acres contain some of the most
special trees on earth. All right, so there's good
news and bad news today. The good news is that the
park service just reopened the grove with the largest redwoods, so that's where I'm driving to now. The bad news is that I have
to leave for the airport in about an hour, so I gotta scramble. So there's a handful of people out here who have pretty much devoted their lives to wandering this forest,
hunting for the tallest, most impressive trees. And in the early 2000s, they struck gold, discovering numerous trees here more impressive than any others on earth, trees that probably came
within weeks of being cut down. Among them, the tallest
tree on the entire planet. The location of these trees
was kept secret out of concern that too many visitors
would damage the ecosystem. And with miles of bushwhacking
off trail required to reach the trees, the
National Park Service said it would be near
impossible to find them, but a few people still wanted to try. I found this discussion thread
of people trying to find one of these trees, and it
really does seem impossible. One of the best clues is that you, quote, pass through a keyhole in the landscape before getting to the tree. It's like pirates hunting
for buried treasure. But somehow, in 2010, after
two years of searching, the first person finds it. By 2014, 8 people have found this tree, only one each year, and all of them have kept the location under wraps and stressed the importance
of treading lightly, navigating the forest, respectfully. But in October of 2015,
all of that changes. An anonymous website leaks the location of many of these champion trees. Photos, GPS coordinates
and detailed instructions for getting there. For a handful of the most
impressive trees on earth, a new Gold Rush has kinda just started. Within a matter of
months, new foot traffic has caused noticeable damage
to the trees' surroundings. Bushwhacking to the trees has made trails in the previously untouched forest; Visitors standing on
their bases to take photos has damaged the trees and killed
the surrounding vegetation; Garbage, and even human waste, has been left in the area; People have gotten lost and injured trying to navigate the remote
and overgrown wilderness. And eventually, this is the result: A complete closure with
visitation resulting in a fine of up to $5,000 and up to
six months of jail time. The story has one final twist. The tallest tree is not
towering over all the others. It's like a foot taller
than the second tallest. Now consider that trees
grow and at different rates. 16 years after its discovery,
it is entirely possible, if not, probable, that this is not actually
the tallest tree. What we do know is that if
there is a new taller tree, it almost certainly won't be publicized. Researchers are gonna do
whatever it takes to protect it. And it seems now the only way to do that is to pretend it isn't there at all. And that is why this story matters. It is maybe the best example of the danger the internet presents to the outdoors. Social media makes it
so easy for a beautiful, impressive location to blow up. But when those locations are sensitive and can only handle small
amount of delicate foot traffic, there needs to be a barrier to entry, some level of research
and effort to get there. It's either that or this. (whimsical music) I don't mind not knowing which
of these is the tallest one. What makes this place
special isn't standing at the base of a tree
and knowing it's secret, it's looking up at the canopy and knowing that it's out there somewhere, silently growing old in a
world high above our own. Thanks for watching. (soft music)
