Arboreal wonders of the world

The General Sherman is a giant among giant sequoias in California. At 84m (275ft) it is shorter than the tallest tree but it is three times bigger by volume. Its 1,487 cubic metres could probably provide every copy of the Guardian for a month or build a small town Photograph: Getty Images

Every year General Sherman grows a millimetre all around, and this is reckoned to add enough wood to make an entire 18.3m (60ft) tall tree. Its largest branch fell off in January 2006, but it is still bigger than any other Photograph: David Kjaer/NPL/Rex

How big is big? Well, 17 men standing fingertip to fingertip might just reach the 31m (102ft) round the base of General Sherman Photograph: Daisy Gilardini/The Image Bank

Earth's oldest living inhabitant, Methuselah, is a bristlecone pine nearly 3,050m (10,000ft) up in California's white mountains. It was found in 1957 and is reckoned to be 4,768 years old - so it would have been a seedling when the pyramids went up. A much older pine, known only as WPN-114, was casually cut down in 1964 by a geography student Photograph: Dennis Flaherty/Getty Images

Methuselah's exact location is kept a secret to protect it from axe-wielding students and tourists Photograph: Don Smtih/Getty Images

The plane tree of Hippocrates is said to be the oldest tree in Europe, a 2,500-year-old colossus on the island of Kos, Greece Photograph: AA World Travel Library/Alamy

Tourists are told that the father of western medicine, Hippocrates, as well as the Apostle Paul, taught their students in its shade. Others say thieves used to be hanged from its branches Photograph: Stephanie Colasanti/Corbis

The Stronardon douglas fir near Dunans castle in Argyllshire is 63.79m (209ft) high and has just beaten the grand fir at Blair castle in Perthshire to the title of Britain's tallest tree. It was planted in 1848 but was only measured accurately on 19 February 2009 by Mark Tansley and Steve Woollard, two Hampshire arboriculturalists Photograph: Lukasz Warzecha/PIN

Americans give their big trees mythological names and when naturalists Chris Atkins and Michael Taylor found a whopper coast redwood in a remote area of northern California in September 2006 they called it Hyperion Photograph: Mario Vaden

Hyperion was measured at 115.55m (380ft) high, and so became the tallest living tree in the world. It would be even bigger but woodpeckers have probably damaged its top. How no one spotted it before is uncertain, but don't go looking for it. The exact location has been kept a secret Photograph: Darrell Gulin/Corbis