Here’s What Happened to the Trees That Once Orbited the Moon

This Doug fir "moon tree" was planted at the University of Oregon in Corvallis, Ore., in 1976, after taking a trip around the moon in 1971. (Source: NASA)Last weekend, America celebrated the 50^th anniversary of Neil Armstrong’s “one small step” on the moon on July 20, 1969. But not many recall that several trees have been there, too—or at least, their seeds have.

As detailed in a report by National Geographic, on the Apollo 14 mission in 1971, astronaut Stuart Roosa brought along hundreds of tree seeds in his personal kit. A former smoke jumper with the U.S. Forest Service, Roosa served as the command module pilot during the mission, orbiting the moon as fellow astronauts Alan Shephard and Edgar Mitchell traveled to the surface. After completing the mission and arriving back on the pale blue dot, many of the seeds were ceremoniously planted around the country during bicentennial celebrations in 1976—and then largely forgotten about.

It wasn’t until decades later that NASA started compiling a database for the locations of the scattered “moon trees,” the report states. Eighty trees have been verified so far on the database, with species including sycamore, loblolly pine, redwood, Douglas fir and sweetgum. The trees appear no different from regular trees, though they were never formally studied during their growth, according to the report. There’s no word on whether any of them were ever used for any out-of-this-world wood flooring projects, but researchers are still finding forgotten ones.

The full story of the moon trees can be found here.