Acacia Seed Travels from Hawai’i to Reunion Island 1.4 Million Years Ago

A recent study led by Johannes Le Roux, a molecular ecologist at Stellenbosch University in Matieland South Africa proposes that a sea bird brought a seed from Hawaii to Reunion in its stomach or stuck to its feet in a one-off event some 1.4 million years ago.

Emma Marris writes in Nature International Journal of Science that this, along with other newly discovered long-distance events, points to the role of improbable events and serendipity in shaping which species occur where.