It Took 60 Million Years For A Bacteria to Develop That Could Decompose Trees
Today, trees take anywhere from 46 to 124 years to decompose. And as humans, we have come up with ways to use fallen trees for our own benefit like building houses and burning wood. But what happened to trees millions of years ago when they fell in the forest? Well, it turns out that it took 60 million years for there to even be a bacteria that exists that had the ability to decompose trees in the first place.
Back then, trees were very tall, skinny, and strange looking compared to modern-day trees. They had very shallow root systems, and fell quite often. So over tens of millions of years, trees kept falling on top of one another without decomposing. This is how we get coal. That’s why it’s called a “fossil fuel”, and why it is a finite resource.
