Finding the Mother Tree: Uncovering the Wisdom and Intelligence of the Forest

by Suzanne Simard

in 1992, when winter temperatures had increased by a few degrees and the coldest months stopped dropping below minus thirty, allowing the beetle larvae to thrive in the thick phloem of the aging pines. Lodgepole pine had coevolved with the beetles in this landscape, naturally succumbing after about a century to create space for the next generation. As the trees declined, fuel accumulated as a matter of course, and wildfires were ignited by lightning or people. Flames released pine seeds from resinous cones and stimulated aspens to sprout from thousand-year-old root systems, their moist leaves reducing the flammability of the young forest. As fire fingered through the landscape, it petered out in these aspen-clad glades, leaving a mosaic of different-aged forests that was itself resistant to future fires. But in the late 1800s, European settlers disrupted this balance by burning the forest montage to the ground in search of gold, creating a vast blanket of new pine stands whose uniformity was later enhanced by fire suppression and herbicide spraying that ensured the aspens weren’t interfering with profits. As these pine trees turned one hundred and the climate warmed, the beetle populations exploded and the landscape ran red like blood flowing through water.