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Forest Wisdom And Respecting Mother Earth

to112 hair serum on forest moss tree in background

We know that communication happens beyond mankind in the animal kingdom, but what about in other non-human, non-animal elements? Like trees, perhaps?

Last year Ecologist Suzanne Simard gave an enlightening Ted Talk outlining two decades of research asserting that not only do trees communicate, but they recognize offspring and 'help' eachother by transferring nutrients to neighbouring trees before dying.

"Now, we know we all favor our own children, and I wondered, could Douglas fir recognize its own kin, like mama grizzly and her cub? So we set about an experiment, and we grew mother trees with kin and stranger's seedlings. And it turns out they do recognize their kin. Mother trees colonize their kin with bigger mycorrhizal networks. They send them more carbon below ground. They even reduce their own root competition to make elbow room for their kids. When mother trees are injured or dying, they also send messages of wisdom on to the next generation of seedlings. So we've used isotope tracing to trace carbon moving from an injured mother tree down her trunk into the mycorrhizal network and into her neighboring seedlings, not only carbon but also defense signals. And these two compounds have increased the resistance of those seedlings to future stresses. So trees talk." - Simard

 

Who else wants to hug a tree now?