Amber with Pine Needles Aged 50 Million Years Found in Kaliningrad Region

The Kaliningrad Amber Plant JSC (KAYK, 100% owned by Rostec) has extracted an inclusion featuring needles of an ancient pine tree estimated to be 50 million years old, the company’s press service reported.

The unique amber specimen was discovered during manual sorting of stones on the first working day of the new year, January 9. The plant has not extracted such inclusions for the past five years, according to the press release.

The inclusion represents a rare case of a fragment of ancient flora preserved in resin, retaining its shape and color. The bundle of five pine needles has a slightly greenish hue. Experts estimate the inclusion's age to be up to 50 million years.

The inclusion weighs 29 grams and measures 57 by 45 mm.

“This is the first such specimen found at the plant in the last five years. Most often, we extract amber with inclusions of insects, arachnids, crustaceans, and other fauna. Plant inclusions are rare due to their fragility and positioning. From flora, we occasionally find fern leaves, moss, fragments of the cypress family, and rare flower buds. These belong to the forest’s lower tiers. Pine needles, part of the upper forest tier, are challenging for resin to capture during its flow. For this reason, finding an inclusion with an intact bundle of pine needles is exceptionally rare,” said Anna Dugina, a gemologist at the plant, as quoted by the press service.

Inclusions make up about 5% of the total volume of transparent amber extracted at KAYK. They are manually selected during the sorting stage. The stones then undergo several evaluation stages. Depending on the size and uniqueness of the inclusions, they are divided into two grades. First-grade inclusions are polished and presented at unique stone auctions, while second-grade samples are used for jewelry and souvenirs.

The discovered inclusion will be polished and showcased at the auction of unique amber as part of the 8th International Economic Forum of the Amber Industry, AmberForum 2025.

The Kaliningrad region, particularly near the village of Yantarny, contains 95% of the world's amber reserves. In the region, industrial amber extraction is exclusively conducted by KAYK. In 2024, the plant extracted 627 tons of amber.

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.