The Pando Living Map Project: documenting an ancient lifeform

Pando is the world’s largest tree of any kind. Located in the Fishlake National Forest in south-central Utah, the Pando Tree is simultaneously the largest tree by weight (5.98 million kilogrammes), the largest tree by landmass (43.2 hectares) and the largest aspen tree, while also being the oldest tree in the Americas – at least 9,000 years old and perhaps as much as 16,000 years old according to the best testing methods we have today. Discovered in 1976 by Burton Barnes, the tree features 47,000 genetically identical trunks interconnected via a root system that could span 19,312km if laid end-to-end and which coordinates energy production, defence and regeneration as a single organism; a forest of one tree. 

Work to protect, monitor and care for this natural wonder got underway in 1987. Various groups have worked to restore the tree, as it was the subject of severe degradation due to human development efforts previous to its discovery. Founded in 2019, Friends of Pando is dedicated and working to care for the tree alongside Pando’s federal stewards, Fishlake National Forest. We also work with a broad coalition of organisations at the state and community level to achieve our mission. In 2022 Friends of Pando began work, and in 2023 we launched the Pando Living Map Project to document this previously undocumented wonder and to record efforts to protect it to ensure it can be enjoyed for generations to come. 

Making one who moves over the land, visible 

Born of a single seed the size of a grain of rice, Pando, whose name means ‘I spread’, has been moving over its homeland, amoeba-like for millennia. Each trunk’s root serves as a node where the fast-growing tree can spread outward again. That process of self-propagation is driven by the balance of hormones between the root and the sky. Auxin leads upward growth and, as it does, suppresses cytokinins, the regenerative hormone. Each individual tree is a microcosm of the larger system; it will rise and gather energy which will be shared with the larger whole. When a trunk dies, cytokinins will again dominate the hormone balance and spur new growth from the root. It is in this way that Pando moves; able to grow a metre a year upward and connected to a network life one kilometre wide, growth can appear within the landmass, or expand on the boundaries. 

That effort is simultaneously chemical, physical and mathematical. Regeneration is driven by an ancient hormone cycle. What grows above ground, stabilises and balances energy gathering potential across the tree. Pando’s movement over the land develops in response to hormone balances and welcomes disturbances and adversity; a fire, drought or wind storm may decimate numbers above ground, while below ground, the regenerative action is amplified. No surprise then, when work got underway to document the tree, there were three different physical maps used to describe the tree, each based on a working concept of how the tree moves over time: a genetic map based on 184 plots where tree tissues were gathered; a developmental map is used by land managers in work to protect and plan for work on the tree; a field map, arguably a hybrid of the two. It is through the application of all three maps and new ones that we can protect, monitor, and restore the tree. The Pando Living Map project works to tell the story of caring for an ancient wonder who has borne witness to five epochs of human culture. 

A living map 

Dating back to the late 1980s, land managers, ecologists and independent scientists have defined models and methods to care for Pando. While in many ways we can care for Pando quite like we would a perennial crop, given proper investments and fieldwork, that effort requires yearly investments. Previous to Friends of Pando, work on Pando was developed and undertaken in a stop-and-start fashion, a process that had grown rife with recriminations as philosophies of the hour exhausted goodwill while budgets waxed and waned. 

Thanks to collaboration between Pando’s federal land stewards, Snow College (Richfield), our technology partners and volunteers across the world, we can begin to tell a new story about work to care for Pando. Version 2 of the Pando Living Map project not only provides physical maps, but allows users to examine and compare data we collect in the effort to protect and care for the tree and understand the year-over-year investments and challenges. As we move toward a third version, there are plans to marry 2D physical maps, LiDar scans with 360-degree photography of site across the tree. 

In all, a full picture of a wonder we are still coming to know with value for laymen, land managers and researchers alike. To meet Pando and explore its expanse in maps and 360-degree imagery, we welcome you to visit www.friendsofpando.org.