As written in the July/August 2006 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review:

Sarah Sallon, director of the Louis L. Borick Natural Medicine Center in Jerusalem asked archaeologists for some of the date palm seeds they found during excavations of Herod's palace at Masada.  One sprouted and is now over 2 feet high and has five leaves (a sixth leaf was removed for DNA testing).  It is the oldest seed ever to be successfully germinated!  At one time the Jordan River valley and the shore of the Dead Sea were covered in thick forests of date palms, the fruit of which was written about in the Bible and the Koran.  However, cultivation of the tree was abandoned after the Roman conquest of Judea, and this particular species has long been considered extinct!  How's that for a real life Jurassic Park!