Wood ear mushroom

Wood ear mushroom this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. For a small forest, see Woodland. For wood as a commodity, see Timber. This article needs additional citations for verification.

Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Wood is a structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. Wood has been used for thousands of years for fuel, as a construction material, for making tools and weapons, furniture and paper. As of 2020, the growing stock of forests worldwide was about 557 billion cubic meters. As an abundant, carbon-neutral renewable resource, woody materials have been of intense interest as a source of renewable energy. A 2011 discovery in the Canadian province of New Brunswick yielded the earliest known plants to have grown wood, approximately 395 to 400 million years ago. Wood can be dated by carbon dating and in some species by dendrochronology to determine when a wooden object was created.

Recent use of wood has been enhanced by the addition of steel and bronze into construction. The year-to-year variation in tree-ring widths and isotopic abundances gives clues to the prevailing climate at the time a tree was cut. Diagram of secondary growth in a tree showing idealized vertical and horizontal sections. A new layer of wood is added in each growing season, thickening the stem, existing branches and roots, to form a growth ring.