After 2,000 Years, These Palm Seeds Have Finally Sprouted

[Mangosteen]

Six date seeds as old as the Dead Sea Scrolls are now flourishing as trees on a kibbutz.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/02/how-to-grow-a-date-tree-from-2000-year-old-seeds/606079/

[RyManUtah]

9 minutes ago, Mangosteen said:

Six date seeds as old as the Dead Sea Scrolls are now flourishing as trees on a kibbutz.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/02/how-to-grow-a-date-tree-from-2000-year-old-seeds/606079/

How cool! I had only heard of Methuselah. I’m glad there are more. 

[Meangreen94z]

That’s crazy, considering other seeds only have a viability of a few months.

[Mr.SamuraiSword]

This is great!! I just saw this and remembered the first one they germinated couldn't make seeds as it was male. Hopefully some of these new ones are female and a repopulation effort can be made.  Cant wait to see what these look like in 20 years. 

[Mangosteen]

Its too bad the article didn't have any photos. I wonder what one of these palms would sell for on a well publicized palm tree auction site. Probably pay for the expenses of the kibbutz where they are growing for quite a while.

[Mr.SamuraiSword]

5 hours ago, Mangosteen said:

Its too bad the article didn't have any photos. I wonder what one of these palms would sell for on a well publicized palm tree auction site. Probably pay for the expenses of the kibbutz where they are growing for quite a while.

Heres some photos of the 6 new ones from an article from The Atlantic

[James B]

Incredible!

[The Germinator]

Great article.... do they think it is dactylifera?

[cisco]

On 2/5/2020 at 11:44 PM, Mr.SamuraiSword said:

This is great!! I just saw this and remembered the first one they germinated couldn't make seeds as it was male. Hopefully some of these new ones are female and a repopulation effort can be made.  Cant wait to see what these look like in 20 years. 

Yes. There are 2 females. Great news. 

[Dave-Vero]

The scientific report.  Open access.  It assesses The relationship of the germinated seeds to modern dates.  It appears that they are ancient cultivated varieties that were propagated from basal offshoots (pups).  Over the centuries afterward, interest in these cultivated varieties evidently declined and by the 19th century, all the dates in the local area were grown from seed, so whatever special characteristics had been lost.  A bit like growing mangos or apples from seed.  

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/6/6/eaax0384

[kinzyjr]

The methods used to sprout the date pits were used on another old seed:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/lost-biblical-tree-resurrected-1-134721648.html