<story><title>Aussie firefighters save world&apos;s only groves of prehistoric Wollemi pines</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2020/01/16/796994699/aussie-firefighters-save-worlds-only-groves-of-prehistoric-wollemi-pines</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>eloff</author><text>Is anyone else blown away that life as large as a couple hundred of these trees could remain hidden from discovery until 1994 in a developed nation? We&amp;#x27;re talking about a national park in Australia, not the inaccessible depths of the Amazon encircled by the Andes.&lt;p&gt;It makes one wonder what else is out there to still be discovered.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>derrida</author><text>&amp;gt; We&amp;#x27;re talking about a national park in Australia, not the inaccessible depths of the Amazon encircled by the Andes.&lt;p&gt;It is pretty inaccessible. Experienced hikers go missing never to be found all the time in the blue mountains - just walking off the suburban commuter train lines that service sydney. And that&amp;#x27;s in a few kms radius of the train line. The wollemi national park is miles away from that still, has no roads or trails that cross it, and is (was?) true wilderness - right on the outskirts of sydney. Huge part of the map was somewhere there wasn&amp;#x27;t even trails you could get in. Right next to sydney a place of equal size where you could be sure there was not a single human sleeping :)  We&amp;#x27;ll have to see how it recovers.&lt;p&gt;I think what is unusual is people dont&amp;#x27; have an experience of nature anymore where its wild.</text></comment>
<story><title>Aussie firefighters save world&apos;s only groves of prehistoric Wollemi pines</title><url>https://www.npr.org/2020/01/16/796994699/aussie-firefighters-save-worlds-only-groves-of-prehistoric-wollemi-pines</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>eloff</author><text>Is anyone else blown away that life as large as a couple hundred of these trees could remain hidden from discovery until 1994 in a developed nation? We&amp;#x27;re talking about a national park in Australia, not the inaccessible depths of the Amazon encircled by the Andes.&lt;p&gt;It makes one wonder what else is out there to still be discovered.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>pjc50</author><text>Needle in a haystack. It&amp;#x27;s roughly as inaccessible as the Amazon; at least there you have water. We &amp;quot;know&amp;quot; as a matter of statistical likelihood that there are significant numbers plant and animal (mostly insect) species in the Amazon that have been destroyed by human action before they can be meaningfully catalogued, it&amp;#x27;s just fortunate that these trees have been found and protected.</text></comment>