Recent books such as Richard Powers’ novel The Overstory, and Peter Wohleben’s The Hidden Life of Trees, have helped develop our knowledge about the unique role that trees play in the ecosystem. Suzanne Simard’s Finding the Mother Tree is a compelling memoir and an immensely readable addition to this body of literature.
For generations Suzanne’s family made their living cutting down trees in British Columbia but her ancestors, she says, logged with a lighter touch. Early in her career Suzanne, who describes herself as a forest detective, became one of the first women to be employed in the logging industry. But today, she says, this industry’s management practices threatens the survival of our forests, particularly with climate warming.
Finding the Mother Tree is a fascinating account of Simard’s scientific quest to unlock the enigma of why the land mends itself when left to its own devices. It follows Suzanne’s journey to uncover the mysteries of forests and their interconnected role in the ecosystem. Once controversial, Suzanne’s research reveals that trees in forests communicate underground through an immense web of fungi and this fungal network wires the trees for fitness. She explains how the biggest, oldest timbers, the Mother Trees, use this network to regenerate seedlings and to nurture their young, providing food and water. Most startling was the fact that trees emit chemical signals identical to our own neurotransmitters and that they have human-like behaviours.
Finding the Mother Tree is a thought-provoking and uplifting book exploring how trees might save us in the future.
Reviewed by Karen Williams
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
SUZANNE SIMARD is a Canadian scientist best known for the research she conducted on the underground networks of forests characterised by fungi and roots. She studies how these fungi and roots facilitate communication and interaction between trees and plants. Within the communication between trees and plants is the exchange of carbon, water, nutrients and defence signals between trees.
She used rare carbon isotopes as tracers in both field and greenhouse experiments to measure the flow and sharing of carbon between individual trees and species, and discovered, for instance, that birch and Douglas fir share carbon. Birch trees receive extra carbon from Douglas firs when the birch trees lose their leaves, and birch trees supply carbon to Douglas fir trees that are in the shade.
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