KarunaNews Story

In a warehouse in rural Michigan is Archangel Ancient Tree Archive, a living library of the world’s mightiest trees. At 75, David Milarch is trying to save the world’s last old-growth forests from extinction — by using their DNA to help reverse climate change. Cloning these giants involves scaling the trees to the high points where the newest growth sprouts, snipping off the most vital tips, and then coaxing them to root. But his goal isn’t just to preserve trees on his 150-acre farm in Copemish. He sends his saplings and tissue cultures all over the world. In the US, his coast redwoods thrive in Central Florida, sequoias in Oregon, and red ash clones at the Pentagon. He planted a clone of Methuselah, the oldest bristlecone pine in the world at over 4,800 years old, at the Charles University in Prague where Einstein once lectured. His saplings now grow in 55 US cities and on Indigenous land. But the project closest to his heart is in Detroit, where he works with students at ‘tree school’. The city is home to 225 giant sequoias, some already 10 feet tall, planted by the nonprofit Arboretum Detroit in one of the city’s most environmentally burdened neighborhoods.