Silphium was from the Roman city of Cyrene, and its sap was prized. The plant itself had small yellow flowers and wasn’t famous for its appearance. The smelly sap was so valuable that it was worth its weight in gold.

Silphium

This tree grew over 125 feet tall. It was a coniferous tree that was wiped out in a volcanic eruption. It went extinct in its home of Patagonia, Argentina, about 160 million years ago.

Araucaria Mirabilis

We currently make fossil fuels out of this plant. Its heydey was the late Carboniferous Period which was approximately 300 million years ago. It existed worldwide.

Sigillaria

Tulare Saltbush

Also known as the Bakersfield saltbush, agriculture drove this plant to extinction around 1991. It was an annual herb that relied on inland lakes and aquifers for water which was drained as the Central Valley of California was developed.

This tree was lost because it was overharvested due to its fragrant wood. It was last seen on the South Pacific island of Robinson Crusoe in 1908.

Chile Sandalwood Tree

Fagopsis Longifolia is an extinct plant found in the Florrisant Formation near Colorado Springs, CO. It lived during the Eocene Epoch, which was about 56-40 million years ago.

Fagopsis Longifolia

This plant is up for un-extinction because scientists have reconstructed its DNA. The driving force for this is to bring the plant’s scent back to life. This plant lived in South Africa.

Wynberg Conebush

These were semi-aquatic plants, and they were probably the first to sport a stem. They lived along coastlines and were one of the first terrestrial plants on the planet. They appeared over 400 million years ago.

Cooksonia