A single aspen colony in Utah called Pando covers 106 acres, weighs 6,000 tons, and is genetically one organism connected by a root system that may have been alive for 14,000 years and is now slowly being eaten to death by mule deer
Pando, a single male quaking aspen in Utah's Fishlake National Forest, spans 106 acres as roughly 47,000 genetically identical trunks connected by one root system — and unchecked mule deer browsing is now eating the next generation before it can grow.