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Jaramillo Petrified Forest National Park, Argentina - Long before the Andes mountain range was formed, the area northeast of Argentina’s Santa Cruz Province was an area of dense forest characterized by giant conifer trees.

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Jaramillo Petrified Forest National Park, Argentina - As the Andes were born in a burst of volcanic eruptions about 160 million years ago, the site was buried in successive waves of ash and lava, burying the flora.

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Jaramillo Petrified Forest National Park, Argentina - Besides Jaramillo's astonishing abundance of preserved trunks lying on the surface of the ground, fossilized cones from the trees have also been found.

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Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona, USA - Located in northeastern Arizona state, this beautiful national park is among the world’s most famous petrified forests.

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Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona, USA - Its tree fossils date back to the Late Triassic Period, about 225 million years ago.

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Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona, USA - It is believed that people inhabited the area between 8,000 and 10,000 years ago.

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Yellowstone Petrified Forest, Wyoming, USA - More than 50 million years ago, redwoods, maples, magnolias, oaks, dogwoods, and pines flourished in this region—until volcanic activity from the nearby Absaroka Mountain range buried it all in ash.

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Yellowstone Petrified Forest, Wyoming, USA - Silica-rich groundwater began to seep into the trunks, replacing the organic matter inside and preserving the wood.

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Yellowstone Petrified Forest, Wyoming, USA - The process of "freezing" the trees is believed to have taken about 200 years, and the cycle repeated itself for tens of thousands of years. Ice from the last ice age, as well as running water and wind, eventually uncovered the fossils, allowing us to admire these treasures today.

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Fossil Forest, England -

The most complete fossilized record of a Jurassic forest found anywhere in the world is located in Dorset, southern England. Sited to the east of Lulworth Cove on the Isle of Purbeck are the remains of a 185-million-year-old fossil forest.

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Fossil Forest, England -

Accessible only when the Lulworth Range Walks are open, the dramatic remains of the bowl shapes left when trunks rotted away are clearly visible.

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Ginkgo Petrified Forest, Washington, USA - Covering 7,470 acres, the park contains more than 50 petrified species of trees, including ginkgo, sweetgum, redwood, Douglas fir, walnut, spruce, elm, maple, horse chestnut, cottonwood, magnolia, madrone, sassafras, yew, and witch hazel.

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Ginkgo Petrified Forest, Washington, USA - About 15.5 million years ago, the region was home to many plant species that are now extinct. A number of them were buried in volcanic ash. With time, the organic matter in their trunks was slowly replaced by minerals, which petrified them.

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Ginkgo Petrified Forest, Washington, USA - At the end of the last ice age, about 17,000 years ago, the catastrophic Missoula Floods eroded the basalt protecting the petrified wood, exposing the beautiful colors we see today.

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Escalante Petrified Forest State Park, Utah, USA - Within this park, you will find more than just petrified wood. A visitor center built in 1991 features displays of plant and marine fossils, petrified wood, as well as fossilized dinosaur bones from the Upper Jurassic Period, dating back to more than 150 million years ago.

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Escalante Petrified Forest State Park, Utah, USA - The fossilized wood you see in this park is multicolored, in shades of red, yellow, white, and black.

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Escalante Petrified Forest State Park, Utah, USA - Before the park was established, the beautiful, colored wood was prized by hobbyists.

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Curio Bay, New Zealand - The petrified logs from ancient conifers scattered in Curio Bay date back to the Jurassic period, around 170 million years ago! An expansive forest once covered Curio Bay, located on the South Island of New Zealand, in what was part of the eastern margin of the super continent known as Gondwanaland.

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Curio Bay, New Zealand - The forest was destroyed multiple times by huge sheet floods of ash and volcanic debris, eventually turning the wood into stone. Today, at low tide, the Curio Bay petrified forest can be admired for what it is, one of the most extensive and least disturbed fossilized forests in the world.

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Zion National Park Petrified Forest, Utah, USA -

Located in the upper portion of the Chinle Formation in Zion National Park, the petrified formations are composed largely of mudstones deposited by low-energy meandering rivers.

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Zion National Park Petrified Forest, Utah, USA -

The bright-colored layers are largely made up of bentonite clay, as the result of volcanic ash weathering.

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Zion National Park Petrified Forest, Utah, USA -

The ash was produced by volcanoes located west and south of the Colorado Plateau. It was then transported by rivers and streams to the Chinle Formation.

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Petrified Forest of Lesvos, Greece - Sited on the Greek island of Lesbos (Lesvos), the Petrified Forest of Lesvos is believed to be the largest accumulation of petrified wood in Europe. Created 20 million years ago, the trees were preserved and fossilized by a series of volcanic eruptions that smothered vast swathes of forest in thick black ash. Trees identified include laurel, poplar, walnut, and ash.

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Petrified Forest of Lesvos, Greece - A museum sited in the vicinity showcases the forest (petrified pieces of trunks, branches, roots, seeds, and leaves are presented in front of detailed explanation panels) and the evolutionary history of volcanic activity in Greece.

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Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota, USA -

North Dakota was once a densely forested area, as hard as that might be to imagine. During the Paleocene epoch, between about 67 and 55 million years ago, the western part of the state housed a subtropical to temperate forest with trees up to 3.6 m (12 ft) in diameter and more than 30 m (100 ft) tall.

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Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota, USA -

Within this national park you’ll find coniferous stumps still standing upright from two successive forests that have eroded out of the Sentinel Butte Formation. These trees are related to the modern sequoia.

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Theodore Roosevelt National Park, North Dakota, USA - These stumps were preserved because they were buried by floods as they inundated the forest floor. The exposed portions of the trees simply decayed away, leaving just the stumps behind.

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Calistoga Petrified Forest, California, USA -

This is the world’s only petrified forest that dates back to the Pliocene epoch.

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Calistoga Petrified Forest, California, USA - Located in Sonoma County, this forest also houses the world’s largest petrified trees, some reaching more than 45 m (150 ft tall). 

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Calistoga Petrified Forest, California, USA - The privately-owned park is open to the public. 

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Mississippi Petrified Forest, Mississippi, USA -

Located near the town of Flora, this privately owned park formed 36 million years ago when an ancient river flooded and washed away everything in its path, including the magnificent trees.

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Mississippi Petrified Forest, Mississippi, USA - With each fresh flood, more sand and silt would cover the logs, eventually petrifying them. The size of these petrified logs indicates that the living trees must have stood more than 30 m (100 ft tall), and were more than 1,000 years old.

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Prehistoric Kauri Forest, New Zealand - While it cannot be described as a true petrified forest, some of kauri’s trees are partially petrified. The kauri tree is among the world’s mightiest trees, growing to over 60 m (196 ft) in height, with trunk girths up to 16 m (52 ft). Found on New Zealand’s North Island, most of those designated as "ancient kauri" have been buried for up to 45,000 years.

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Prehistoric Kauri Forest, New Zealand - Semi-petrified kauri wood is considered to be "the oldest workable wood in the world." Kauri gum is a fossilized resin extracted from kauri trees, which is made into artifacts such as jewelry.

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Gallatin Petrified Forest, Montana, USA - One of the largest petrified forests of the Eocene epoch, some of the trees found within the Gallatin Range are 50 million years old. Many of the species in the forest were covered in ash while still alive, leaving them standing.

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Gallatin Petrified Forest, Montana, USA - Located within the mountains outside of Yellowstone National Park, other gems you might find on this trail include deer, elk, black bears, and even grizzly bears.

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Wolverine Petrified Wood Area, Utah, USA - Located near the mouth of Wolverine Canyon, this area contains the second-largest assembly of fossilized wood in North America.

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Wolverine Petrified Wood Area, Utah, USA -

Had you stood here 225 million years ago at the beginning of the Mesozoic era (or the age of the dinosaurs), you would have found yourself in the middle of a lush forest.

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Wolverine Petrified Wood Area, Utah, USA -

At the time, streams in the Chinle basin flowed in a north to northwesterly direction toward the sea, and the now-petrified wood were trees that grew along the banks of one of the streams.

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José Ormachea Petrified Forest, Argentina - Also known as the Sarmiento Petrified Forest, this is one of Patagonia’s great natural wonders.

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José Ormachea Petrified Forest, Argentina - A cherished natural monument, the petrified forest lies in an arid desert region where some of the finest examples of petrified coniferous tree trunks in the world are found.

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José Ormachea Petrified Forest, Argentina -

Estimated to be about 165 million years old, many of the trunks and scattered wood chips are in excellent condition and remain as a testament to when Patagonia was one of the greenest places on the planet.

See also: The enchanted forests that look like they're straight out of a fairy tale. 

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