Deep underground, trees communicate with one another. It’s a concept that’s still fresh to science, yet it’s rooted in ancient beliefs.
Scientists are now confirming that forests function as a single superorganism. Fungal roads run beneath the earth, connecting the trees. The elder trees care for their young along this route. Furthermore, the trees interact with other species and communicate with them. As a result, they may be able to assist one another, in contrast to the concept of selfish rivalry.
On ‘The Wood-Wide Web,’ trees converse.
Yes, trees communicate with one another, but how?
Fungi and plants created symbiotic associations termed mycorrhizae after millions of years of evolution beginning 600 million years ago. The name is derived from the Greek words for fungus and root.
The following is how it works: In exchange for the trees’ sugars and carbon, the fungi offer the minerals, nutrients, and a communication network that the trees require.
The mycorrhizal network, like an internet connection, extends across the forest. Hyphae, or fungal threads, provide a highway that connects tree roots. Trees can then deliver and receive goods such as these:
- Nitrogen
- Sugars
- Carbon
- Phosphorous
- Water
- Signals of defense
- Chemicals
- Hormones
Amazingly, a single tree may convey signals to hundreds of neighboring trees. Bacteria and other microorganisms exchange nutrients with fungi and tree roots along the threads.
The Tree Network on a Global Scale
Scientists started mapping the “wood wide web” on a global scale in 2019. The multinational investigation since then has created the first global map of the mycorrhizal fungal network. It’s also possible that it’s the world’s most important and ancient social network.
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Forests are protected by ‘Mother Trees.’
Suzanne Simard, an ecologist at the University of British Columbia, has been studying how trees communicate for three decades. She has discovered how the network she refers to as “the otherworld” connects life in forests after much experimentation.
“Trees form the backbone of forests,” Simard adds, “but a forest is much more than what you see.”
“You see, there’s this otherworld underground, a world of limitless biological passageways that connect trees and allow them to interact, allowing the forest to behave as if it were a single creature.” It may evoke a sense of intelligence in you.”
Hub trees, which she refers to as Mother Trees, can foster budding saplings by reaching out along the network. When older trees pass away, they may leave behind nutrients, genes, and even a type of wisdom. Trees get vital resources and insight into their environment by tapping into the otherworld.
The resilience of the Community
As a result, connected trees have a considerable advantage in terms of strength and durability. When a tree is cut off from the network, however, it becomes vulnerable. They frequently succumb to disease at considerably higher rates than the general population.
Unfortunately, practices such as clear-cutting and replacing forests with a single species have a devastating effect on this delicate ecology. Unfortunately, trees that do not connect to the community network are more susceptible to disease and insects. Harvesting becomes unsustainable as a result.
Simard mentions the following in a TED talk:
“…Trees converse. [Trees] boost the community’s resilience by having back-and-forth talks. It’s likely to remind you of our social communities and families, at least part of them,” Simard added.
Trees and Ancient Beliefs
Scientists can now confirm that trees socially communicate with one another. The concept, however, isn’t new. For example, the Tsimshian people of the Pacific Northwest Coast have recognized for millennia that life in the trees is interrelated.
Sm’hayetsk Teresa Ryan, Suzanne Simard’s graduate student, is Tsimshian. Ryan discussed how Simard’s investigations of mycorrhizal networks are related to aboriginal customs in a recent New York Times article. European settlers, on the other hand, were eager to disregard these notions.
“Everything is related, everything is connected,” Ryan remarked. “Many aboriginal cultures will tell you stories about how all the species in the forests are connected, and many will discuss below-ground networks,” says the author.
Simard mentions the following in a TED talk:
“…Trees converse. [Trees] boost the community’s resilience by having back-and-forth talks. It’s likely to remind you of our social communities and families, at least part of them,” Simard added.
Trees and Ancient Beliefs
The Menominee Forest is a forest in Menominee, Michigan.
Ryan described how the Menominee tribe of Native Americans harvests the 230,000-acre Menominee Forest in Wisconsin in a sustainable manner. Rather than focusing on money, they concentrate on the environment and are well compensated for it.
“Thinking in terms of full systems, with all their interconnections, implications, and feedback loops,” the Menominee believe, is what sustainability entails. They keep a vast, old, and diverse growth stock, favoring the removal of low-quality and ill trees above more healthy ones, and allowing trees to live for 200 years or more – a process Simard may refer to as “grandmothering.”
The forest is still profitable, healthy, and thickly forested today because old-growth is allowed to continue.
“Even though more than 2.3 billion board feet of timber have been removed since 1854 — about double the volume of the entire forest – there is currently more standing timber than there was when logging began. In one study, the Menominee wrote, “Too many, our forest may appear clean and untamed.” “In truth, it’s one of the Lake States’ most intensively maintained forest tracts.”
What if Native tribes’ wisdom was used to manage all forests? Consider what may be achieved if forests were always sustainable rather than exploited for short-term gain.
The Classical Republic
As we learn more about the complex network of forests, it becomes evident that we must drastically alter our approach to them.
“The destruction of an old-growth forest is not just the ruin of gorgeous individual trees — it’s the collapse of an ancient republic whose interspecies covenant of reciprocation and compromise is necessary for the survival of Earth as we’ve known it,” Ferris Jabr writes.
Thousands of scientists, including Sir David Attenborough, think that immediate action is required to address the climate issue. Forests are an important part of the rehabilitation process. As a result, rewilding the earth, recovering forests, and sustainably managing forests as stewards are major priorities.
“We’ve taken trees for grants and removed about half of the woods on our globe,” Attenborough added. “Forests, fortunately, have a remarkable ability to regenerate,” he explained.
It’s vital to protect historic woods after decades of deforestation. As part of a critical worldwide repair, Attenborough urges for better farming techniques and the planting of additional trees. In exchange, humans would enjoy more natural forests than ever before, the climate would be stabilized, and we would have access to all of the resources we require.
The Life-Giving Tree
The Tree of Life is a symbol of connection and reverence in ancient traditions from all around the world.
“Trees have long been connected symbols. An enormous tree grows at the center of the universe in Mesoamerican mythology, stretching its roots into the underworld and cradling Earth and heaven in its trunk and branches. A tree called Yggdrasil appears in Norse cosmology. The Times’ Ferris Jabr noted, “A popular Japanese Noh drama tells of wedded pines who remain eternally united despite being separated by a wide distance.”
The ceiba tree was the Tree of Life in ancient Mesoamerica when the world came into being. Its roots reached deep into the depths of the earth, while its branches supported the sky. The Tree of Life was said to be in the Garden of Eden in the Bible.
The Ished-Tree, where the gods were born, is also mentioned in Egyptian mythology. Artists in ancient Assyria frequently sculpted a tree that some claim resembles DNA in sculptural reliefs. A mystical tree appears in Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Judaism, among other world religions.
Trees have always been essential to cultures all around the world. Protecting trees and our interrelated natural world has never been more vital than it is today.
