Normally, trees of this species — known as red mangroves, or Rhizophora mangle — grow only in salt water, along tropical coastlines. But this forest is located near the San Pedro River in the state of Tabasco, more than 125 miles (200 kilometers) from the nearest ocean. Somehow, these mangroves have adapted to live exclusively in this freshwater environment in southeast Mexico.
Exactly how this ecological enigma came about has baffled scientists. But now, an international, multidisciplinary team of researchers has revealed that this out-of-place ecosystem began growing around 125,000 years ago, when sea levels were much higher and the ocean covered most of the region.
"The most amazing part of this study is that we were able to examine a mangrove ecosystem that has been trapped in time for more than 100,000 years," lead author Octavio Aburto-Oropeza, a marine ecologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, said in a statement. It was like putting together a "lost world," he added.
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