A Kenyan environmentalist hugged a palm tree for 72 straight hours in Nyeri county to draw attention to the rapid loss of the country’s native forests, many of which face extinction.
Truphena Muthoni’s feat, reported by Mongabay contributing editor Lynet Otieno, is in the process of being considered for a new Guinness World Record. It surpassed the previous longest tree hug, also held by Muthoni, by more than 24 hours. She didn’t eat or sleep for the duration of the hug.
Muthoni began her embrace of a royal palm (Roystonea regia) tree on Dec. 8 and ended the 72-hour feat around midday on Dec. 11, cheered on by crowds that included the Nyeri county governor, Mutahi Kahiga, as well as an online audience of hundreds of thousands.
“I want to inspire people to fall in love with nature and treat it with care,” Muthoni told Kenyan newspaper Daily Nation. “Conservation begins with love. Nowadays, there are many tree-planting initiatives, but people often replace Indigenous forests with saplings, believing it is mitigation, yet it is not. We must first protect what we already have.”
According to the latest State of the World’s Trees assessment, Kenya is home to 1,131 tree species, but more than 13% are threatened with extinction due to deforestation, climate change and urbanization. The royal palm that Muthoni hugged isn’t native to Kenya; it comes from the American tropics.
Of Kenya’s 49 endemic tree species on record, most are under some level of threat. Nineteen are endangered and another eight are listed as critically endangered.
The endemic and endangered Meru oak (Vitex keniensis), for example, is one of the nation’s largest trees, growing to a height of 35 meters (115 feet). It’s found in a handful of locations, including on Mount Kenya, close to where the tree hug took place.
Pandanus kajui, another endemic tree, is important for stabilizing riverbanks in wetland ecosystems. It has also been classified as endangered and is found in only five locations in Kenya.
On Dec. 15, Kenyan President William Ruto appointed Muthoni as the ambassador for the nation’s campaign to plant 15 billion trees, increasing Kenya’s total area of tree cover from 12% to 30% by 2032.
“This is profound,” Ruto said during a conversation with Muthoni. “I am sure this will have a big impact, that people will think about trees much more positively.”
On Dec. 17, Muthoni was also awarded a full scholarship to Mount Kenya University.
Read the story by Lynet Otieno here.
Banner image: Truphena Muthoni hugging a tree for 72 consecutive hours. Image by Nyeri Governor Mutahi Kahiga via X.
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