_Now these historic ditches and root bowls occur in all the present
Sequoia groves and forests, but as far as I have observed, not the
faintest vestige of one presents itself outside of them_.
We therefore conclude that the area covered by Sequoia has not been
diminished during the last eight or ten thousand years, and probably not
at all in post-glacial times.
_Is the species verging to extinction? What are its relations to
climate, soil, and associated trees?_
All the phenomena bearing on these questions also throw light, as we
shall endeavor to show, upon the peculiar distribution of the species,
and sustain the conclusion already arrived at on the question of
extension.
In the northern groups, as we have seen, there are few young trees or
saplings growing up around the failing old ones to perpetuate the race,
and in as much as those aged Sequoias, so nearly childless, are the only
ones commonly known, the species, to most observers, seems doomed to
speedy extinction, as being nothing more than an expiring remnant,
vanquished in the so-called struggle for life by pines and firs that
have driven it into its last strongholds in moist glens where climate is
exceptionally favorable.
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