Author | David Suzuki & Wayne Grady |
---|---|
Illustrator | Robert Bateman |
Country | Canada |
Language | English |
Subject | Nature |
Genre | Non-fiction |
Publisher | Greystone Books |
Publication date | September 2004 |
Media type | Print (hard and paperback) |
Pages | 192 |
ISBN | 978-1-55365-016-4 |
OCLC | 55682161 |
582.16 22 | |
LC Class | QK494.5.P66 S89 2004 |
Tree: A Life Story (or Tree: A Biography in Australia) is a Canadian non-fiction book written by David Suzuki and Wayne Grady, and illustrated by Robert Bateman. The book profiles the life of a Douglas-fir tree, from seed to maturity to death. The story provides ecological context by describing interactions with other lifeforms in the forest and historical context through parallels with world events that occur during the tree's 700 years of life. Digressions from the biographical narrative, scattered throughout the book, provide background into related topics, such as the history of botany.
Suzuki was inspired to write a biography of a tree when he noticed a Douglas-fir with an uncharacteristic curve in its trunk and speculated what caused it to grow into that shape. Suzuki studied the topic with the help of a research assistant and solicited Grady to help write the book. Vancouver publishers Greystone Books released the book in September 2004. In the Canadian market, it peaked at number three in the Maclean's and the National Post 's non-fiction best seller lists and was nominated for several awards. In February 2005 it was published in Australia by Allen & Unwin. The premise and writing were well received by critics. While several reviewers found that the authors succeeded in using accessible language, others found it too technical.
Inspiration for the book came from a Douglas-fir tree with a curve in its trunk. [1] While sitting by the tree, at his home on Quadra Island, near Vancouver, David Suzuki realized that even though his family had played on it for years, he did not know how old it was or how its uncharacteristic curve had developed. [1] [2] Suzuki, a science writer and broadcaster, and former zoologist, speculated that the soil might have slid when the tree was young or that another plant might have blocked the sunlight. He thought that the tree must have endured much hardship throughout its life and made a connection between biographies of people and the story of this tree's life. [2] It also reminded him of an idea he had for a children's book about interconnectivity of life, especially within plants. [3] Along with a research assistant, he studied the topic. Suzuki started to write a draft but a busy schedule interfered so he sought a collaborator. [3] Science writer and former Harrowsmith editor Wayne Grady agreed to participate. Suzuki provided the research, framework, and some original writing and Grady did most of the writing. Together, Grady in Ontario and Suzuki in Vancouver, went through five drafts. [4] Wildlife artist Robert Bateman was brought into the project through social connections between the wives of Bateman and Suzuki. In creating the book, their intention was to illustrate the complexity and interconnectivity of this ecosystem by focusing on one tree's role over time. [2] [3]
The book consists of five chapters: "Birth", "Taking Root", "Growth", "Maturity", and "Death". The book opens with acknowledgments and an introduction, and closes with selected references and an index. In the introduction, Suzuki describes the tree at his home and the series of ideas and events that led to the writing of the book. Along with the narrative of the tree's life, the book includes digressions into related topics, such as the history of botany and animal life in the forest. The tree written about in the book is not any specific Douglas-fir, but rather a generic one.
The first chapter, "Birth", begins with lightning starting a forest fire. The heat dries the Douglas-fir cones enough for their scales to spread and release winged seeds. Rain water transports one seed to a sunlit area with well-drained soil. Rodents and insectivores, whose food stashes were destroyed in the fire, eat truffles, which survived underground, and leave feces containing nitrogen-fixing bacteria in the soil. Following one dormant winter stage, the seed begins to germinate.
In the second chapter, "Taking Root", the embryonic root emerges through a small opening in the seed coat and through cell division, aided by plant hormones, it grows downward. Water and nutrients enter the root by osmosis and are transported to the seedling. A symbiotic relationship develops between the roots and the truffles. The roots give its extra sugars to the truffles, which it uses for energy, and the truffles assist the roots' uptake of water and nutrients. From excess starches and nutrients gathered by the root, a stem similar to the root but surrounded with thin, grayish bark, grows upwards. As the starch reserves are exhausted, its first needles sprout and photosynthesis begins. The tree anchors itself with a deep taproot and a web of roots begin to grow laterally. Some roots develop symbiotic relationships with near-by red alders which excel at nitrogen-fixation but lack the storage capacity that the Douglas-fir can offer. In early April of every year, a new layer grows between the bark and wood. As this new layer takes over transportation of fluids throughout the tree, last year's layer of cells die and form a ring in the wood.
After about 20 years, the tree begins to develop fertile cones. Buds form where auxins accumulate; these become either new needles or cones. The buds remain undifferentiated until July and continue to develop throughout the fall and winter. The next year, some buds will open in mid-May exposing a new set of needles. The cone buds on the lower end of the tree while other buds burst open in April releasing a mist of pollen. The cones at the top of the tree open their scales for wind-borne pollen to enter. Within the cone, the pollen fertilizes a seed which is released in September. The quantity and quality of seed production varies year-to-year but a particularly effective crop is produced about every 10 years. Less than 0.1% of seeds survive Douglas squirrels, dark-eyed juncos, and other seed-eating animals.
Over the centuries, the tree grows thicker and taller as successive rings develop around its trunk and new buds grow on the branches. The tree becomes part of an old growth forest with a shaded and damp understory of broadleaf trees, shrubs, and ferns. In the canopy, a mat of dead needles and lichen accumulate on the wide upper branches. Exposed to light, air, and rain, the needles decompose and the mat becomes colonized by insects, fungus, and new plants.
In the opening of the final chapter, "Death", the tree is 550 years old and stands 80 meters (260 feet) tall. Under the weight of too much snow accumulating on the canopy mat, a branch breaks off. Stresses from a long winter with a dry summer weaken the tree's immune system. The exposed area where the branch broke becomes infected with insects and fungus. Insect larvae eat the buds and the fungus spreads into the middle of the tree and down to the roots. With its vascular tissue system compromised, the tree diverts nutrients elsewhere, resulting in needles turning orange on the abandoned branches. Death takes years to occur as successive parts are slowly starved of nutrients. As a snag, it becomes home to a succession of animals, like woodpeckers, owls, squirrels, and bats. Eventually the roots rot enough that a rainstorm blows it down. Mosses and fungi grow on the deadfall, followed by colonies of termites, ants, and mites, which all help decompose the remaining wood.
Tree is a popular science book, intended to profile the life of single tree using terminology targeted at a general audience. The narrative provides ecological context, describing animals and plants that interact with the tree, as well as historical context. Parallels to the tree's age are made with historical events, like the tree taking root as empirical science was taking root in Europe during the life of 13th century philosopher Roger Bacon. The book is most commonly described, and marketed, as a "biography". [5] One reviewer grouped it with the 2005 book The Golden Spruce as part of a new genre: an "arbobiography". [6]
The book is written in the third person, omniscient, style. Grady's writing moderates Suzuki's characteristic rhetoric to create writing that is accessible, with a tone described as "a breezy casualness that welcomes the reader". [7] According to Suzuki, making the book accessible required telling the story from a human perspective, including some anthropomorphism of biological processes. [1]
The book was published by Greystone Books, an imprint of Douglas & McIntyre based in Vancouver that specializes in nature, travel, and sports topics. They published the hardcover version of Tree in September 2004. The book is small, measuring only 19×14 cm (7.6×5.4 inches) with 190 pages. Suzuki and Grady promoted it through media interviews and book signing events across Canada. In February 2005, Allen & Unwin published it in Australia as Tree: A Biography. [8] The Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic released the audio book in April 2006. [9] Greystone Books published the trade paperback in February 2007.
In the Canadian market, the hardcover edition peaked at number three in the MacLean's and the National Post 's non-fiction best seller lists. [10] [11] The magazine Science & Spirit published an excerpt in the January–February 2005 edition. [12] [13] It was nominated for the 2004 Canadian Science Writers' Association's Science in Society Journalism Award for 'General Audience Book', the 2005 B.C. Booksellers' Choice Award and the 2006 Council on Botanical and Horticultural Libraries' Annual Litereature Award for best 'General Interest' book. The French translation by Dominique Fortier was nominated for the 2006 Governor General's Awards for best English to French translation.
The premise of a biography for a tree was well received. [14] [15] The writing was called engaging, lyrical, and compelling. [15] [16] [17] Robert Wiersema wrote, "Tree is science writing at its finest. It's sweeping but focused, keenly aware of both the minutiae and the big picture. ... Although some of the concepts are complex, the writing is always accessible ... Scientific matters are explained in layman's terms, and the text never bogs down or bottlenecks." [7] However, some reviewers found the language too technical. [18] [19] In the Montreal Gazette , Bronwyn Chester wrote that the scientific language "dilut[es] our feeling and concern for this tree through too much information". [20] Robert Bateman's black and white illustrations, while skilled, were said to add little to the narrative. [16]
A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus Pinus of the family Pinaceae. Pinus is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. The World Flora Online created by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Missouri Botanical Garden accepts 187 species names of pines as current, together with more synonyms. The American Conifer Society (ACS) and the Royal Horticultural Society accept 121 species. Pines are commonly found in the Northern Hemisphere. Pine may also refer to the lumber derived from pine trees; it is one of the more extensively used types of lumber. The pine family is the largest conifer family and there are currently 818 named cultivars recognized by the ACS.
Pseudotsuga macrocarpa, commonly called the bigcone spruce or bigcone Douglas-fir, is an evergreen conifer native to the mountains of southern California. It is notable for having the largest cones in the genus Pseudotsuga, hence the name.
The Douglas fir is an evergreen conifer species in the pine family, Pinaceae. It is native to western North America and is also known as Douglas-fir, Douglas spruce, Oregon pine, and Columbian pine. There are three varieties: coast Douglas-fir, Rocky Mountain Douglas-fir and Mexican Douglas-fir.
Pseudotsuga menziesii var. glauca, or Rocky Mountain Douglas-fir, is an evergreen conifer native to the interior mountainous regions of western North America, from central British Columbia and southwest Alberta in Canada southward through the United States to the far north of Mexico. The range is continuous in the northern Rocky Mountains south to eastern Washington, eastern Oregon, Idaho, western and south-central Montana and western Wyoming, but becomes discontinuous further south, confined to "sky islands" on the higher mountains in Utah, Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico, with only very isolated small populations in eastern Nevada, westernmost Texas, and northern Mexico. It occurs from 600 m altitude in the north of the range, up to 3,000 m, rarely 3,200 m, in the south. Further west towards the Pacific coast, it is replaced by the related coast Douglas-fir, and to the south, it is replaced by Mexican Douglas-fir in high mountains as far south as Oaxaca. Some botanists have grouped Mexican Douglas-fir with P. menziesii var. glauca, but genetic and morphological evidence suggest that Mexican populations should be considered a different variety.
Conifers are a group of cone-bearing seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the division Pinophyta, also known as Coniferophyta or Coniferae. The division contains a single extant class, Pinopsida. All extant conifers are perennial woody plants with secondary growth. The great majority are trees, though a few are shrubs. Examples include cedars, Douglas-firs, cypresses, firs, junipers, kauri, larches, pines, hemlocks, redwoods, spruces, and yews. As of 1998, the division Pinophyta was estimated to contain eight families, 68 genera, and 629 living species.
A spruce is a tree of the genus Picea, a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. Picea is the sole genus in the subfamily Piceoideae. Spruces are large trees, from about 20 to 60 m tall when mature, and have whorled branches and conical form. They can be distinguished from other members of the pine family by their needles (leaves), which are four-sided and attached singly to small persistent peg-like structures on the branches, and by their cones, which hang downwards after they are pollinated. The needles are shed when 4–10 years old, leaving the branches rough with the retained pegs. In other similar genera, the branches are fairly smooth.
A truffle is the fruiting body of a subterranean ascomycete fungus, predominantly one of the many species of the genus Tuber. In addition to Tuber, many other genera of fungi are classified as truffles including Geopora, Peziza, Choiromyces, Leucangium, and over a hundred others. These genera belong to the class Pezizomycetes and the Pezizales order. Several truffle-like basidiomycetes are excluded from Pezizales, including Rhizopogon and Glomus. Truffles are ectomycorrhizal fungi, so are usually found in close association with tree roots. Spore dispersal is accomplished through fungivores, animals that eat fungi. These fungi have significant ecological roles in nutrient cycling and drought tolerance.
Alnus rubra, the red alder, is a deciduous broadleaf tree native to western North America.
Pinus virginiana, the Virginia pine, scrub pine, Jersey pine, Possum pine, is a medium-sized tree, often found on poorer soils from Long Island in southern New York south through the Appalachian Mountains to western Tennessee and Alabama. The usual size range for this pine is 9–18 m, but can grow larger under optimum conditions. The trunk can be as large as 20 inches diameter. This tree prefers well-drained loam or clay, but will also grow on very poor, sandy soil, where it remains small and stunted. The typical life span is 65 to 90 years.
Abies balsamea or balsam fir is a North American fir, native to most of eastern and central Canada and the northeastern United States.
Larix laricina, commonly known as the tamarack, hackmatack, eastern larch, black larch, red larch, or American larch, is a species of larch native to Canada, from eastern Yukon and Inuvik, Northwest Territories east to Newfoundland, and also south into the upper northeastern United States from Minnesota to Cranesville Swamp, West Virginia; there is also an isolated population in central Alaska. The word akemantak is an Algonquian name for the species and means "wood used for snowshoes".
Cunninghamia is a genus of one or two living species of evergreen coniferous trees in the cypress family Cupressaceae. They are native to China, northern Vietnam and Laos, and perhaps also Cambodia. They may reach 50 m (160 ft) in height. In vernacular use, it is most often known as Cunninghamia, but is also sometimes called "China-fir". The genus name Cunninghamia honours Dr. James Cunningham, a British doctor who introduced this species into cultivation in 1702 and botanist Allan Cunningham.
Abies amabilis, commonly known as the Pacific silver fir, is a fir native to the Pacific Northwest of North America, occurring in the Pacific Coast Ranges and the Cascade Range. It is also commonly referred to as the white fir, red fir, lovely fir, Amabilis fir, Cascades fir, or silver fir. The species name is Latin for 'lovely'.
Abies sachalinensis, the Sakhalin fir, is a species of conifer in the family Pinaceae. It is found in Sakhalin island and southern Kurils (Russia), and also in northern Hokkaido (Japan). The first discovery by a European was by Carl Friedrich Schmidt (1832-1908), the Baltic German botanist, on the Russian island of Sakhalin in 1866, but he did not introduce it to Europe. The plant was re-discovered by the English plant-collector, Charles Maries in 1877 near Aomori on the main Japanese island of Honshū, who initially thought it to be a variety of Abies veitchii. Abies nephrolepis is known to be the closest relative, which exists on the mainland just west of the range of Sakhalin fir.
Pine and fir trees, grown purposely for use as Christmas trees, are vulnerable to a wide variety of pests, weeds and diseases. Many of the conifer species cultivated face infestations and death from such pests as the balsam woolly adelgid and other adelgids. Aphids are another common insect pest. Christmas trees are also vulnerable to fungal pathogens and their resultant illnesses such as root rot, and, in the U.S. state of California, sudden oak death. Douglas-fir trees in particular are vulnerable to infections from plant pathogens such as R. pseudotsugae.
In botany, a tree is a perennial plant with an elongated stem, or trunk, usually supporting branches and leaves. In some usages, the definition of a tree may be narrower, including only woody plants with secondary growth, plants that are usable as lumber or plants above a specified height. In wider definitions, the taller palms, tree ferns, bananas, and bamboos are also trees. Trees are not a taxonomic group but include a variety of plant species that have independently evolved a trunk and branches as a way to tower above other plants to compete for sunlight. The majority of tree species are angiosperms or hardwoods; of the rest, many are gymnosperms or softwoods. Trees tend to be long-lived, some reaching several thousand years old. Trees have been in existence for 370 million years. It is estimated that there are some three trillion mature trees in the world.
Laminated root rot also known as yellow ring rot is caused by the fungal pathogen Phellinus weirii. Laminated root rot is one of the most damaging root disease amongst conifers in northwestern America and true firs, Douglas fir, Mountain hemlock, and Western hemlock are highly susceptible to infection with P. weirii. A few species of plants such as Western white pine and Lodgepole pine are tolerant to the pathogen while Ponderosa pine is resistant to it. Only hardwoods are known to be immune to the pathogen.
Sequoia sempervirens is the sole living species of the genus Sequoia in the cypress family Cupressaceae. Common names include coast redwood, coastal redwood, and California redwood. It is an evergreen, long-lived, monoecious tree living 1,200–2,200 years or more. This species includes the tallest living trees on Earth, reaching up to 115.9 m (380.1 ft) in height and up to 8.9 m (29 ft) in diameter at breast height. These trees are also among the oldest living things on Earth. Before commercial logging and clearing began by the 1850s, this massive tree occurred naturally in an estimated 810,000 ha along much of coastal California and the southwestern corner of coastal Oregon within the United States.
The Propagation of Christmas trees is the series of procedures carried out to grow new Christmas trees.
Pseudotsuga menziesii var. menziesii, commonly known as Coast Douglas-fir, Pacific Douglas-fir, Oregon pine, or Douglas spruce, is an evergreen conifer native to western North America from west-central British Columbia, Canada southward to central California, United States. In Oregon and Washington its range is continuous from the Cascades crest west to the Pacific Coast Ranges and Pacific Ocean. In California, it is found in the Klamath and California Coast Ranges as far south as the Santa Lucia Mountains with a small stand as far south as the Purisima Hills, Santa Barbara County. In the Sierra Nevada it ranges as far south as the Yosemite region. It occurs from near sea level along the coast to 1,800 metres (5,900 ft) in the California Mountains. Further inland, coast Douglas-fir is replaced by Rocky Mountain or interior Douglas-fir. Interior Douglas-fir intergrades with coast Douglas-fir in the Cascades of northern Washington and southern British Columbia.