Hope Sprouts for World's Rarest Tree

On a remote Chilean island, botanists are trying to keep a species alive that's literally down to one wild tree—and a new effort shows promise, reports Live Science. Conservationists collected seeds from the tree, Dendroseris neriifolia, on Robinson Crusoe Island and sent them to the Millennium Seed Bank at Kew Wakehurst site in England. X-rays suggested 25 of 29 seeds were viable, per Phys.org, and seven seedlings are now germinating at the facility.

Dendroseris neriifolia was widespread as recently as the late 19th century, but it's been reduced by habitat loss, invasive species, grazing, and past logging to a single cliff-hugging specimen that rangers brace with ropes so it doesn't topple. (See an image.) Each March, Chilean park staff make a four-hour journey to the site, followed by a two-hour climb to reach the tree, then edge along the trunk to net its ripe seeds. This is the first year they've been sent to the MSB, potential insurance if that last wild specimen fails. "We hope to be able to produce more seed from the plants which we have growing now once they reach flowering age," Alice Hudson of the MSB tells Live Science.