The Secret Life of Trees
I’ve discovered many new things walking my morning path. I’ve become very familiar with the trees there, and how they have survived the frequent onslaught of the power company cutting them out of the way of power lines; the irony of which is the power still goes off quite often. There are a few varieties of oaks, including one ancient live oak, some very tall pines, and crepe myrtles. The live oak is like a whole ecosystem of its own: besides the birds that nest there, moss and ferns grow where limbs branch out. Another oak that I love has grown a bridge between the two main diverging trunks. I call it the “Siamese Oak.” The crepe myrtles grow beautiful trunks when left to grow naturally and not hacked off every year; in the South we call this “crepe murder.” The trunks look almost like velvet they are so smooth. Two such crepe myrtles on my walk have trunks that look like the separate stalks have been braided and grown together forming a ridged trunk, reminding me of the Siamese Oak.
My fascination with these trees led me to do some research. I had heard that trees communicate through their roots, so I went in search of how this happens. I ran across an article by Richard Grant in the March 2018 edition of the Smithsonian Magazine about a book entitled The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate, by a German forester named Peter Wohlleben.
Wohlleben says that trees of the same species are communal and can form alliances with trees of others species. Trees are connected through underground fungal networks called mycorrhizal networks. Through these networks tree share water and nutrients as well as communicating, sending distress signals regarding drought, disease or insect attacks. This allows the trees to alter their behavior as a result. They communicate by sending chemical, hormonal and electrical signals through the networks. They can also communicate through the air using pheromones and other scent signals which are detected by other trees through their leaves.
The mycorrhizal networks are made up of hair-like root tips that form a symbiotic relationship with fungi. The fungi use 30% of the sugar that trees photosynthesize and the fungi get nitrogen, phosphorous and other minerals from the soil that is then consumed by the trees. Young saplings can’t get enough sun to photosynthesize so they are nurtured by the canopy of larger trees, giving them the nutrients they need to survive.
It seems like trees could teach humans a thing or two about surviving by cooperating with one another. Our tribal nature could benefit by noting how trees of different species form alliances, and our parenting could improve by following the example of how they nurturing their young. These “tree lessons” inspired me to a bit of poetry in the form of a haiku:
Trees have much to teach.
Listen to their breezes sing
Wise and ancient songs.
