Steve, ENTS, Yesterday I wrote:
> Once I > leafed a tree book in a book store; there was a question, which is the > tree species with the greatest range in the world. The author supposed > it could be white spruce, Siberian larch (L. sibirica) or Dahurian > larch (L. gmelinii). I am almost sure I remembered that wrong: the question was not which one has the greatest range but which one is the most COMMON tree species, i.e. which one has most specimens. So, white spruce has for sure more specimens than quaking aspen as the spruce is often a dominant in vast Canadian boreal forests and the aspen is a pioneer tree. Likewise, in Eurasia there are boreal broadleaf trees (e.g. Betula pendula, Populus tremula) with huge ranges from western Europe over Siberia to the Pacific. The ranges are probably greater than that of white spruce but these broadleaf trees are rarely dominants and so have not so many speciemens. - Kouta
