Why a legendary ninety-foot fossil tree on a Siberian island is a complete myth

Countries & Cities · Published 30 September 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island is a frozen archive of Earth's history, but popular accounts have distorted its reality. While explorers once discovered ancient wood in the permafrost, sensationalist claims about ninety-foot fruit trees are entirely fictional. Modern science reveals a far more complex story of shifting climates and ancient ecosystems.

Located between the Laptev and East Siberian Seas, Bolshoy Lyakhovsky Island serves as a critical site for understanding Arctic environmental history. The island is composed of a complex geological foundation, ranging from Precambrian metamorphic rocks to thick Cenozoic sediments. Crucially, the island is defined by its massive permafrost, which has acted as a natural freezer for thousands of years, preserving everything from mammoth remains to ancient plant life.

In the late 19th century, Baron Eduard von Toll reported finding a frozen alder tree, Alnus fruticosa, measuring roughly 15 to 20 feet in length. Over time, this discovery was heavily misrepresented by various authors who inflated the tree's height to 90 feet and incorrectly labeled it a fruit or plum tree with green leaves still attached. These claims, found in books like Earth's Shifting Crust, have been thoroughly debunked by researchers who emphasize that such descriptions are entirely unsupported by the physical evidence.

Recent multidisciplinary studies have replaced these myths with precise data. By using radiocarbon, optically stimulated luminescence, and uranium-thorium dating, scientists have mapped the island's sediment layers. They found that the fossils Baron von Toll discovered actually span different geological periods, including the Eemian interglacial and various Pleistocene glacial stages. This research confirms that the island's history is not a single frozen moment, but a layered record of dramatic climatic shifts, including periods of extreme cold and warmer interstadial environments.

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