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The Forest in the Tree: How Fungi Shape the Earth
This is a story about trees and fungi connected through a "wood wide web" told by one tiny fungal spore.
A little fungus meets a baby cacao tree and they learn to feed each other. They cooperate with a forest of plants and a metropolis of microbes in the soil. But when drought strikes can they work together to survive?
The fourth book in the Small Friends Books series, this science-adventure story explores the Earth-shaping partnerships between plants, fungi and bacteria.
Features:
A little fungus meets a baby cacao tree and they learn to feed each other. They cooperate with a forest of plants and a metropolis of microbes in the soil. But when drought strikes can they work together to survive?
The fourth book in the Small Friends Books series, this science-adventure story explores the Earth-shaping partnerships between plants, fungi and bacteria.
Features:
- GenresNonfictionScienceNature
48 pages, Hardcover
Published October 20, 2020
46 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
June 22, 2022
This book is fabulous. I hope one day I’ll have a sciency grandchild to read this book with.
December 2, 2020
Another fabulous book b published by CSIRO. All about fungii and its importance to trees and soil. Great for any age child or teenager.
January 25, 2022
The cover looks like something to attract a child but contents quickly develop into a more complex book. Nicely educational
January 18, 2021
I adore this series of Small Friends books from Scale Free Network, and I've featured both the prior books on Small Things Considered, where a review on this and The Forest in the Tree: How Fungi Shape the Earth will appear soon.
A story of a Glomus fungus spore that learns cooperation with a Theobrama cacao plant in the Amazon, written from the first-person fungal perspective. I particularly enjoy that voice here, as it changes from the singular “I” to the collective “We” with the progression of symbiosis: “Here, I branch and branch again until I’m like a tiny tree inside the tree” soon turns to “We…have our threads in many places at once – linked to hundreds of other trees and smaller plants… We are part of an enormous forest web”. Together with Streptomyces, Pseudomonas, Azospirillum, and Bacillus species this forest web grows and adapts to the stresses of drought to survive. Notable in the scientific appendices of this book are sections on human interactions with soil and how humans can engage in soil conservation. Also, there is a fantastic two-page spread illustration on elemental cycling.
Whether for yourself, to share with a child, or for education, this should be an essential addition to any microbe- or nature-lover’s library.
A story of a Glomus fungus spore that learns cooperation with a Theobrama cacao plant in the Amazon, written from the first-person fungal perspective. I particularly enjoy that voice here, as it changes from the singular “I” to the collective “We” with the progression of symbiosis: “Here, I branch and branch again until I’m like a tiny tree inside the tree” soon turns to “We…have our threads in many places at once – linked to hundreds of other trees and smaller plants… We are part of an enormous forest web”. Together with Streptomyces, Pseudomonas, Azospirillum, and Bacillus species this forest web grows and adapts to the stresses of drought to survive. Notable in the scientific appendices of this book are sections on human interactions with soil and how humans can engage in soil conservation. Also, there is a fantastic two-page spread illustration on elemental cycling.
Whether for yourself, to share with a child, or for education, this should be an essential addition to any microbe- or nature-lover’s library.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews