Vox ·Behind the news
America’s Tallest, Most Spectacular Trees Are Getting…heat Stroke?
by Neel Dhanesha
Published 2026-10-06 06:00:00-04:00
What happens to a thousand-year-old tree when it gets too hot to breathe?
0:00 / 8:42 · Narrator Gacrux
Context
A Vox piece published on 6 October 2026 tracks a quiet crisis inside America's tallest trees. Coast redwoods are famous for surviving wildfires and living for millennia, but extreme heat exposes a physical vulnerability. When temperatures spike, the trees close their pores to save water, effectively shutting down their ability to take in carbon and feed themselves. With the coastal fog that usually cools them disappearing, the question is no longer just whether these giants will stop growing. It is what happens to the ecosystems suspended in their branches when the trees begin to starve.