BRITS heading to a Butlin's holiday camp this year can also pay a trip to the site of the world's oldest forest. For the last five years, a fossil forest in upstate New York had been considered to be the oldest-known forest on the planet. However, a new discovery made in England earlier this year shows that forests were growing on the south coast around 390 million years ago.
The new found forest, the remains of which were uncovered back in March, is about four million years older than the previous record holder from the US. Scientists uncovered what they believe to be the world's oldest fossil forest hidden in the cliffs along the Devon and Somerset coast. The fossil forest dates back to the Devonian Period, 419 million to 358 million years ago, when life on earth was experiencing massive changes.
The fossilised trees were uncovered in the Hangman Sandstone Formation near Minehead, close to the Butlin's holiday camp . These formations are found along the South West Coast Path, looking out over the sea. Researchers from both Cardiff and Cambridge Universities said the palm-like plants would have had thin trunks with hollow centres and wouldn't have looked like woodland does now.
Professor Neil Davies, from the Cambridge Department of Earth Sciences, said: "This was a pretty weird forest, not like any forest you would see today." He added that undergrowth and grass were yet to appear. Instead, twigs dropped by the trees had a "big effect" on the landscape.
Davies said life was.