Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest

by Suzanne Simard

Every root looked tenacious in its unique way, though their common job was to graft the trees to the earth. White papery birch, purple-red cedar, reddish-brown fir, black-brown hemlock. Keeping the mammoths from tipping over. Tapping the water that ran deep. Creating pores for water to trickle through and bugs to crawl along. Allowing roots to grow downward to access minerals. To keep the outhouse hole from caving in. Making it hard as hell to dig through. Shovels were thrown down in favor of the axes to chop through the woody foundation of the forest. Then the spades were used again, only to encounter boulders speckled white and black. Rocks of all sizes, some as big as basketballs and others small as baseballs, wedged into the earth like bricks cemented into a wall. Dad ran to the boathouse for a crowbar. Taking turns, the men levered each rock out of its tight nook—turning, scraping, coaxing. It dawned on me that the gritty soil was a pile of pulverized rock grains. Beaten down by fall rains, dried to dust in summer. Frozen and cracked in winter, then thawed in spring. Eroded by water trickling over millions of years.