California Redwoods are fertilized by dust from the Gobi Desert

California Redwoods

Planet Earth is amazing. Even if we are separated by continents, and even if we are several thousand kilometers apart, what happens where we live can influence the rest of the globe. And not only that, but to what may seem like a soil poor in nutrients, for other plants it is the best fertilizer in the world.

According to a study conducted by scientists at the University of Michigan, UC Merced, and the University of Wyoming, Redwoods growing in California's Sierra Nevada are fertilized by dust from the Gobi Desert, which stretches from northern China to Mongolia.

California redwoods live in an area where phosphorus is one of the least present basic elements in the soil. This mineral is very important for plants, not only for these huge conifers, but also for other plant beings, since without it they would not be able to grow properly and would end up dying.

Fortunately for the redwoods and the other plants that live with them, the dust of the Gobi desert, once it is deposited on the ground, with the rains the phosphorus it contains becomes available to plants, which absorb it through their roots.

Gobi desert in Mongolia

Experts believe that, although the desert advances due to global warming, more dust will be moved carrying phosphorus and other essential nutrients for distant mountain ecosystems. However, if the plants cannot adapt to the new weather conditions, the nutrients in the soil will be of no use.

Plants expel oxygen through photosynthesis, a gas without which none of us would be here today. Based on this, I think it is very important that governments and ourselves protect them. Something as simple as planting a tree helps improve air quality and makes the landscape look greener.

If we do nothing, sooner or later we have a lot of problems.

You can read the study here (In English).


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