The Art of Manliness - How to Read a Tree

00:00:00.000 brett mckay here and welcome to another edition of the art of manliness podcast

00:00:10.760 when you're walking in the woods you're often surrounded by trees but you probably don't

00:00:15.500 notice them much and when you do spot some irregularity like a strange bulge in the trunk

00:00:19.680 of a tree you likely don't have any idea how it got there but my guest says these trees you're

00:00:24.180 passing by have all kinds of stories to share and once you learn their language they can tell you

00:00:28.680 all sorts of secrets about the world and even help you navigate it tristan gooley is an adventurer

00:00:33.840 expedition leader natural navigator and author of how to read a tree today on the show he unpacks

00:00:39.600 the clues in a tree's shape branches bark roots and leaves what they can tell you about the

00:00:44.620 environment and how they can help you find your way we also talk about what looking at a tree stump

00:00:49.300 can reveal the hidden seasons in trees and the first place to look in a tree to spy fall foliage

00:00:54.380 we end our conversation with how to get started with reading trees today after the show's over

00:00:59.260 check out our show notes at awimp.is slash read a tree

00:01:02.180 all right tristan gooley welcome back to the show

00:01:23.720 thanks brett so we've had you on the podcast a few times to talk about how to navigate your world

00:01:29.920 just by looking at your environment and you got a new book along the same lines but this is called

00:01:35.660 how to read a tree clues and patterns from bark to leaf so this is how we can look at trees

00:01:40.680 and we can navigate with trees you know get our bearings in the world but also what i love about it

00:01:45.420 is you answer some questions that i've had whenever i'm out on a hike and i'm looking at a tree

00:01:50.040 for example like one we'll talk about today i hope is you know you're walking you see this tree and

00:01:54.700 there's like this weird bulbous growth in the middle of the trunk and then it goes back to normal

00:01:58.760 like what is going on there and what i love about all your books and i got this with this book too

00:02:03.560 is when you read it you immediately have things that you start looking at in your environment that

00:02:08.600 just opens up like new worlds that you didn't know existed you kind of it feels like you're in on a

00:02:13.700 secret and so we're going to learn about the secrets of trees today but before we talk about that

00:02:18.480 you start off the book saying that in order to read a tree it's not really important for people

00:02:23.460 to know the different species of a tree to get the benefit of reading trees why is that

00:02:28.880 i think people can be put off nature by thinking it's about identification but we have to remember that

00:02:37.140 we've evolved to to find meaning in nature without names all over the world you'll find different names

00:02:44.440 for exactly the same tree so there isn't a correct one latin is no use to indigenous people and they 1.00

00:02:50.860 have some of the strongest skills in this area so names are not the answer to finding meaning what we

00:02:56.700 you know have a lot of success with is if we realize that nothing is random and every color every

00:03:02.040 shape and every pattern is trying to reveal something about the life the tree has been through

00:03:06.560 and once we just sort of take that little shift in philosophy we find we are surrounded by clues every

00:03:13.020 single thing we see is revealing something and so while you don't say we should focus on individual

00:03:17.980 species it is useful to know about you know broad families of trees because different families of

00:03:23.140 trees will tell us different things about the environment and like the broadest categories we can look at

00:03:28.780 when it comes to trees are whether they're a conifer or a broadleaf tree what can we learn about the

00:03:35.100 environment depending on whether we see more conifers or broadleaf trees there

00:03:39.680 yeah i think even people new to the idea of of looking at trees are comfortable with the idea

00:03:47.260 that if we've got very dark needle-like foliage that it's a conifer and the conifers as a group

00:03:53.580 evolved first and they have a simple tough architecture and they are really good when the

00:04:00.620 going gets tough if the environment is particularly cold particularly hot very exposed to winds or very

00:04:07.640 dry or the soil is a bit inhospitable then conifers have they've grown up to deal with that broadleaf

00:04:15.380 trees came later and they're more efficient but they have a more delicate system so if the going's

00:04:21.760 easy if there's enough moisture in the soil it's not too hot not too cold the broadleaf trees are more

00:04:26.680 efficient so they will start to out-complete the conifers and what we find is if we see loads of

00:04:32.260 broadleaf trees and again we don't have to worry about names we can just sort of go there are a load of

00:04:36.200 broadleafs there then we can say the going's pretty easy there's enough moisture and it's not too tough

00:04:42.080 which means we're likely to find a lot of other smaller plants a lot of animals a lot of insects

00:04:47.660 a lot of birds and most likely a lot of human beings as well human beings are pretty soft creatures as

00:04:53.200 nature goes so we tend to live in places where there are broadleaf trees if we see conifers there's

00:04:58.080 something tough in the environment so whenever we see conifers we just pause and go what's tough

00:05:02.240 sometimes it's obvious because we're looking you know halfway up a big mountain but it's always worth

00:05:07.240 asking the question

00:05:08.120 yeah i think here in oklahoma so a lot of broadleaf trees but then you get into sort of the more rocky

00:05:13.360 mountainous parts and you just see pine trees primarily something like southeast oklahoma and so

00:05:18.140 you think well the soil is rough here so obviously a conifer would grow here

00:05:21.940 yeah and that's a one one of the ways i think of it is when you're when you might be happier in an

00:05:28.160 all-terrain vehicle a four by four or something like that you know the moment you're thinking that

00:05:32.720 that's the moment the conifers are going to the broadleaf trees okay step aside it's our turn now

00:05:37.440 we're going to take it from here let's talk about the shapes of a tree so every tree is different

00:05:42.600 they're going to be shaped differently because of the environment they find themselves in

00:05:46.280 so what can the shape of a tree tell us about its environment well all trees are a balance of a

00:05:54.020 number of factors but two of the biggest factors are the genetic so the nature and then the environment

00:06:00.060 the nurture so a pine tree for example will never look like an oak tree whatever whatever goes on in

00:06:05.600 the environment so conifers generally speaking tend to be um tall fairly skinny with branches that

00:06:13.060 that aren't horizontal they tend to to flow down more and this is very good at dealing with snow

00:06:18.160 for example but then what we find is the environment will shape each individual tree

00:06:22.400 and one of the core philosophies in the book is no two trees on the whole of planet earth

00:06:27.060 are identical so they might start life with an identical genetic package but then day one

00:06:34.880 they're experiencing slightly different things and we see that in their shape one of the simplest

00:06:39.080 things is is sunlight makes trees shorter and fatter because they don't know what they're going to have

00:06:45.460 to deal with in life so their basic plan is to grow up and to grow you know tall and skinny until they find

00:06:51.000 some sunlight and then when the top of the tree the what's known as the apical bud senses direct

00:06:56.480 sunlight it changes the messages to all the branches in the tree and says okay we can slow the race for the

00:07:01.940 sky now and we can start spreading out so the sunnier a place is the shorter and the fatter a tree is so

00:07:07.660 if there's a particular type of tree you see a lot of just notice how when you see it surrounded by

00:07:12.700 other trees or in other shady places it tends to be tall and skinny and when you see it out on its

00:07:17.920 own drenched in sunlight it's shorter and fatter what can the shape of a tree tell us about the weather

00:07:24.080 in an environment i think last time we had you on we talked about this like sort of micro climate so

00:07:28.180 there's like broad weather patterns but even in a specific area there can be

00:07:32.480 different types of weather so what can the shape of a tree tell us about that

00:07:36.540 each tree will respond to every day of weather i i sometimes think of both the sun and the wind

00:07:42.460 and indeed rain leaving footprints on trees and if if anyone's new to this the wind is a good place to

00:07:48.540 start because you know a light breeze is not going to change a tree in a way that will pick up in a

00:07:53.840 dramatic sense but if you look in exposed areas on high ground if you're in a town or a city there are

00:07:59.480 places where you know the part of the park where a long street leads up to you'll find these gusty winds

00:08:05.500 and what you'll find is for example the branches go shorter on the side the winds come from

00:08:10.000 and there are patterns here long-term trends so in many parts of the world we get more winds from

00:08:15.480 the west or the southwest and we find that that that leaves footprints you'll notice the tops of the

00:08:21.220 trees are bent over and indeed every single branch and actually every single leaf can be read in this

00:08:26.860 way but when anyone's new to this i recommend you know look for the the really bold dramatic stuff

00:08:31.900 go you know whenever you have the opportunity to look at a tree on its own on the top of a hill

00:08:36.300 it will just it will scream a direction and it will tell you a whole story about about what the wind has

00:08:42.020 been doing to it okay so that's one way a tree can help you navigate so if you're looking at it from

00:08:47.400 a long distance away if it looks like one side has shorter branches than the other that's where the wind

00:08:54.080 is hitting it and so you know wind typically comes from the west so you can say well that short side

00:09:00.720 that's west and then the longer side is east yes absolutely and every single part of the tree is

00:09:06.260 responding to that the tree itself will grow shorter in the wind and this leads when you've

00:09:11.580 got a a wood that you can see from a little distance so you've got a little bit of perspective

00:09:16.040 it leads to something i call the wedge effect and this is where trees grow shorter in the wind so what

00:09:21.440 we find is the tree at the windward edge of the wood will be the shortest and then the next tree

00:09:26.320 downwind just a couple of steps to the east is getting a little bit of shelter from the first

00:09:30.840 tree so it grows a tiny bit taller and this leads to a wedge it's sometimes from a distance looks like

00:09:36.480 a sports car driving into the wind and we find there are lots and lots of little little layers that we

00:09:42.640 can add so the trees are shorter but they're also denser because the branches are shorter so we find it

00:09:47.600 looks much darker on the side of a wood that the wind has come from and this is the sort of thing

00:09:52.600 where you might go a couple of days and not see it and then the first time you see it it just screams

00:09:57.020 out to you and our brain absolutely loves that so it kind of stores it it goes i like this i like being

00:10:02.520 able to find meaning in a simple pattern and that starts a relationship with these signs which which

00:10:07.400 all our ancestors had so that's sort of looking at trees overall the shape of a tree but then you start

00:10:13.260 getting more specific different things we can look at in a tree to learn more and one of them is the

00:10:18.140 branches of a tree what kind of trees branches when you look at them closely what can they tell

00:10:22.500 us about the environment and then how can they potentially help us navigate so this is a good

00:10:27.360 example of nature and nurture so again the tree doesn't know the world it's growing up in so it

00:10:33.040 it has to respond to what it finds and the branches the exact angle they start life will depend on on

00:10:39.100 their genes on their species but we don't need to know that but if we imagine branches starting by

00:10:43.940 growing let's say 45 degrees up then from day one the growing bud is responding to light so on the south

00:10:50.840 side the branches grow out towards the southern sky leading to a more horizontal pattern in the

00:10:56.440 branches on the north side of the tree there's no direct sunlight the only light those growing buds

00:11:01.680 get is from directly above the blue sky above them and so that leads to branches on the north side that

00:11:07.060 grow up towards the sky and seen from the side if you look from the east or west side of a tree it

00:11:12.740 sometimes screams out you see these horizontal branches on the south side more vertical branches on the north

00:11:18.180 side and it can look like a check and so i nickname it the check effect or in this country we call it

00:11:22.660 the tick effect well another one too related to this is this idea of the southern eye and this is

00:11:27.780 something you've discovered recently that you kind of discovered it serendipitously when you're out on a

00:11:31.960 hike yeah i was exploring a small nature reserve called snitterfield it's in stratford near sort of

00:11:39.480 shakespeare country and it was the end of a day's micro exploring and i'm always i'm always looking for

00:11:45.760 signs that's what i do that's my job but it's what i do for joy as well and it's been a long fun

00:11:50.900 interesting day and i just stopped and and so often stopping it just it just allows our senses and our

00:11:56.960 brain to notice things that we've been passing and i was just having a snack and and i just suddenly saw

00:12:02.200 the trees looking at me and i thought that's odd and what i was seeing was something that i've i've

00:12:08.300 subsequently nicknamed the southern eye but what it is it does look on smoothbark trees and we might come on

00:12:14.020 to talk about bark but on smoothbark trees it's more dramatic on rough bark it's a little bit harder

00:12:18.160 to make out but you see this this the shape that really does sometimes look exactly like an eye

00:12:23.300 and all it is is where a tree has pruned its own branch off so again trees they're not given any

00:12:30.400 advanced information they don't know what they're going to grow into so what they do is they put out

00:12:34.940 a branch when there's lots of light and then they grow branches higher up and they end up shading

00:12:39.380 their own branches or another tree shades them so instead of keeping a branch that's doing no good

00:12:44.500 and not harvesting any energy they actually they change the message to that branch they shut it down

00:12:49.740 and they seal it off it's almost like closing a gate and that branch will eventually die and fall off

00:12:55.660 and it leaves if the process has gone well and there haven't been any sort of fungi problems or anything

00:13:00.280 like that you're left with this little scar on the bark and depending on the size of the branch

00:13:05.660 the eye it might be very small it might not be much bigger than a coin very often it's it's sort

00:13:10.460 of palm sized and the the thing is because you get more branches on the south side because there's

00:13:16.120 more light eventually you end up with more branches pruned on the south side so more of these southern

00:13:20.920 eyes and the reason i love it is because it's a really good example to me personally where i've spent

00:13:26.840 literally decades looking for these sorts of things and yet something which is quite you know it does

00:13:32.140 stand out when you know to look for it it'll pass me by for years and years and then as soon as you

00:13:37.240 know to look for something it's pretty hard to miss and that's that's a sign i'm onto something when

00:13:41.880 it's when it's obvious in hindsight but we can go our whole lives and almost miss it well another

00:13:47.420 navigation sign you found on trees it's similar to the southern eye is a trunk shoot compass

00:13:52.840 what's a trunk shoot compass yeah so trees have a it's like an emergency plan they have

00:13:59.880 a load of branch buds that are dormant and they sit under the bark and we never see them if things

00:14:06.560 are going well so the chemical messages that typically are coming from the top of the tree down

00:14:11.340 are saying to these dormant buds you just chill out there's no need for you guys to do anything we've

00:14:16.640 got this plan a is working and then if the tree experiences a trauma or stress of some kind it might be

00:14:23.320 fungi it might be a structural problem it might be a storm basically if the tree senses it is under

00:14:29.740 attack and things are going very badly the tree changes the chemical messages and these dormant

00:14:35.320 buds which might have sat there for years and years doing nothing suddenly get a different message it's

00:14:39.580 like pulling the emergency cord the message is okay you guys now need to spring into action and what

00:14:45.000 happens is these buds known as epicormic buds they start to sprout out through the trunk but they

00:14:50.960 respond most dynamically to light and again we get more light from the south side so we find these kind of

00:14:56.880 really bushy little bunches of branches just poking out of the south side of a tree but it typically

00:15:02.080 only happens if that trees experience some trauma but it's it's very common if you walk through through

00:15:07.220 any woodland that are particularly if human beings have been doing anything we tend to make life quite

00:15:11.720 stressful for trees so you're very likely to spot some okay so if you see those little branch shoots

00:15:16.500 from the trunk on that's probably gonna be on the south side that's a navigation tool there let's talk

00:15:21.580 about the trunk in general what can the trunk show us about the tree's environment there are some

00:15:27.100 things that are really glaring and leap out the simplest sign is the texture of the bark all bark

00:15:34.480 is performing the same function so it's quite interesting that we see so many different patterns

00:15:38.880 one of the reasons for the different patterns is the different ways the trees grow they have

00:15:42.840 different strategies to either grow very fast or just grow slowly and bigger and that changes the

00:15:47.840 texture but the simplest sign to look for is rough bark is a sign that that tree is expecting to deal

00:15:54.280 with harsh environment and possibly animals so each family of trees specializes in a different area

00:16:01.160 so birch trees for example are known as pioneer trees and they're kind of the smash and grab family

00:16:06.980 of trees if they see an opportunity so for example if we cleared part of a woodland if you come back in 10

00:16:13.040 years there'll be loads of young birch trees there because they scatter millions of seeds in the wind

00:16:17.500 and and part of their strategy is just to grab a piece of land and grow super fast to just kind of

00:16:23.180 kind of grab it for themselves but because they're expecting to grow up sometimes on their own in quite

00:16:28.940 sort of exposed areas they have this very tough bark and that that protects them against the elements

00:16:33.920 but also against animals other trees have evolved to specialize in woodland settings and they're much

00:16:39.660 more gregarious they're much more social they like to be surrounded by other trees typically of their own

00:16:44.400 kind something like a beech tree very smooth bark so the simple sign is rough bark this is a tree that is

00:16:51.340 more common in open areas at the edges of woodlands so if we're finding our way from the center of a woods

00:16:57.540 out we typically go from smooth bark to rough bark let's talk about those bulges that you might sometimes

00:17:03.200 see growing in the middle of a trunk what's going on there what's what causes that we've got different types

00:17:09.260 of bulges and it can become a very specialist area so i don't want to give the impression that you can

00:17:14.760 diagnose every single thing that's going on for a tree instantly but you get sort of semi-spherical

00:17:19.660 swellings technically known as a spheroblast but that's a good example of the tree scientists

00:17:25.440 putting a sort of complex sounding word on something that they don't fully understand

00:17:28.780 and these buds i mentioned which um sprout out and can give us the trunk shoot compass

00:17:33.860 those buds don't always follow a simple plan and for reasons we don't always understand it could be

00:17:40.180 viruses or fungi they sometimes the plan goes a bit wrong and it leads to a bit of a bulge but that's

00:17:44.740 not always a serious worry for the tree the other types of bulges you get come from structural weaknesses

00:17:51.240 so if there's a storm for example and the trunk suffers a crack if the cracks all the way across the

00:17:58.220 trunk is most likely to be game over but quite often there'll be a crack which is only partially

00:18:03.720 through the trunk and the way the way trees are dealing with these sorts of stresses is to grow

00:18:09.560 extra wood so we'll find ribs that are vertical and we'll find bulges and sort of ring shapes and

00:18:15.720 things like that the only thing we can say for certain is that the tree has grown some extra wood

00:18:19.520 to deal with a challenge identifying exactly what the challenge is can be quite a tall order

00:18:23.520 but if you see that you can assume there was some sort of challenge could have been a fungus could

00:18:27.260 have been you know something broke or whatever and it's just compensating for that so i think

00:18:30.480 that's interesting another interesting thing i learned about trunks from your book

00:18:32.880 is the way trees grow let's say you go to a tree and you carve your initials you shouldn't do that

00:18:40.440 but let's say you do if you were to come back 20 years later 10 years later i think a lot of people

00:18:46.100 think well the carving will be higher but that's not what happens actually the carving stays in the

00:18:51.360 same place even though the tree has gotten taller yes it's a very popular misconception about the way

00:18:57.760 trees grow and i believe it springs from the way we we sometimes see time lapse videos of you know

00:19:05.600 small plants growing from seed and we see them kind of wriggling upwards and of course there has to be

00:19:10.200 some upward growth otherwise a small plant never becomes a tall tree but trees have two types of growth

00:19:15.100 they have primary growth and that's when the little seedling and the green bud is moving upwards and

00:19:21.480 the second a tree forms bark a different type of growth takes place known as secondary growth

00:19:27.560 and this is where it gets steadily fatter but it stopped moving up so the top of the tree where the

00:19:33.040 bud is will continue that primary growth so at the very top of any tree doesn't matter what family or

00:19:38.480 species you're looking at there could be growth going on at the very top where the bud is still

00:19:42.220 going on but if you see bark there is no vertical growth at all what's happening is it's getting

00:19:47.940 steadily fatter and what this means is if you carve something into it like uh of course i wouldn't

00:19:52.740 recommend anybody does that because it does harm the tree but we will come across these markings

00:19:56.880 graffiti you know it's it's it's been common for people to do little love messages you know leo for

00:20:02.420 gemma and what you'll notice is they're nearly always close to head height because that's the height 0.96

00:20:07.360 people carve these things and you can sometimes find graffiti from from 50 years ago maybe even 100

00:20:12.500 years ago occasionally and you'll notice it hasn't moved upwards because the trunk hasn't

00:20:17.940 we're gonna take a quick break for your word from our sponsors

00:20:20.080 and now back to the show so you're likely to encounter tree stumps on a hike and those stumps

00:20:29.700 can be created from a tree falling down naturally or from being cut down anything that stumps can tell

00:20:35.460 us about the environment or help us navigate yeah stumps are a golden opportunity if time allows i

00:20:42.900 encourage everybody to pause for at least a minute and just see if you can find a story about that

00:20:47.420 tree it's come down for a reason as you say it could be a storm and it's worth just sort of saying

00:20:52.800 there that trees typically come down in one of two ways there's what's known as wind throw which is

00:20:58.060 when the root ball is torn out of the ground and the tree stays largely intact that can be used to

00:21:03.640 navigate because they typically come down in a trend in the direction the storm's gone through in

00:21:07.760 but wind snap is when the trunk itself snaps that's very rare unless there's been some weakening like a

00:21:14.420 fungus or a disease of some kind but foresters are constantly felling trees and that's where we get

00:21:20.520 our cleanest stumps and there we can look for slightly different messages because we get to see

00:21:25.420 the rings and a lot of these tree signs would have been known by our ancestors and are indeed known by

00:21:31.500 indigenous people to this day one of the few things that is still common knowledge is counting rings to

00:21:36.300 age the tree but there are lots and lots of subtleties within that so a lot of people aren't aware for

00:21:41.280 example that we only see the rings because there are two types of growth there the early and the late

00:21:45.500 growth and they have slightly different colors which is why we see rings but the more interesting

00:21:49.880 thing from in my world is that the heart of a tree the very center in terms if you count in from the

00:21:57.440 rings you go to the center there the interesting thing is that is not the center by which i mean and

00:22:02.820 it sounds illogical but the heart of a tree the middle of the rings the smallest circle if you like

00:22:09.020 is very very rarely in the center of that trunk and the reason is there are three major factors that

00:22:16.200 will change the pattern in the rings and therefore where we find the heart in the stump so the three

00:22:21.900 factors are light wind and gravity so for example a broadleaf tree because broadleaves and conifers

00:22:29.480 don't respond to things in exactly the same way but if we just think about a broadleaf tree for now

00:22:33.840 more light on the southern side more branches more weight there we end up with the heart slightly

00:22:38.860 close to the southern edge but then what we'll find is it's contending with the wind as well

00:22:43.040 and that will actually push the heart to the opposite direction to the winds coming from

00:22:47.080 and then there's gradient as well i don't want to list all the basically you've got conifers and

00:22:51.600 you've got broadleaves and you've got three different factors but the simple truth is the heart is there

00:22:56.340 for a reason and what i encourage people to do to keep it sort of straightforward and fun

00:23:00.600 early on is the next time you see a freshly or a recently enough cut tree stump on a steep gradient

00:23:07.400 just have a look and it's even better which is quite often when foresters are doing lots of work

00:23:11.540 it's even better when you can see a half a dozen or a dozen of these stumps in one place you'll start

00:23:15.480 to notice the trend you'll start to go ah yeah i can see for example that the hearts are much much

00:23:20.720 closer to the downhill side of the trunk and once we picked up those patterns they form a compass and

00:23:26.680 help us with our journeys well the other interesting thing about uh tree stumps i didn't know this but

00:23:32.020 i've noticed this but i didn't know what was going on it's this cake slice effect so you're looking at

00:23:37.700 a tree stump and it looks like there's this dark triangle and it looks like a piece of cake has been

00:23:44.040 taken out of the tree stump and like the bulge in a tree trunk that cake slice is just a sign that

00:23:50.240 there's some sort of infection the tree encountered and it was trying to to deal with it and just

00:23:55.480 kind of coordinate off yes one of the clever tactics that a tree has is if it's attacked by

00:24:02.460 something like a fungus even if it can't beat the fungus it can box the fungus in so trees can stop

00:24:10.080 infection moving vertically up and down the trunk they can stop a fungus moving in or out i crossing

00:24:16.600 rings but the one we'll see most often is exactly as you described there is if we imagine the spokes on

00:24:23.720 a wheel we have these kind of radial walls that go from the heart out to the the bark and they can

00:24:30.080 lock an infection into a cake slice and quite often this infection will change the color of the wood

00:24:35.900 so if you find um a sawn tree stump or indeed timber stacked you know dozens of logs in a in a pile

00:24:44.020 just keep an eye out and every so often you'll spot this cake slice i think all of us can probably

00:24:49.100 remember pie charts from school it just looks a bit like one of those kind of slices there it's a

00:24:53.080 different color and that's the tree locking a problem into a compartment what can the roots of

00:24:58.300 a tree tell us about the environment and how can they be used to navigate this is a lovely lovely

00:25:04.820 example for me of where i never ever fall into the trap of thinking that i've discovered all the

00:25:09.880 interesting stuff there is to discover i'd be delighted if somebody told me i'd i'd discovered

00:25:13.960 10 of it but but i'd for many years used one tree technique which i'll i'll discuss in a moment

00:25:20.500 but i'd never noticed this the second one which i'll also share in just a sec so the the first one

00:25:25.960 is roots have two two main roles the first is to supply the tree with water and minerals and the

00:25:31.900 second one is to give the tree structural stability because we can imagine if the trunk just went vertically

00:25:36.680 down into the ground the first strong wind that trunk's going to topple so we have guy roots and these

00:25:42.660 roots very like guy ropes on a tent which anchor the tree against the winds and they will grow bigger

00:25:49.560 stronger and longer on the side that the winds come from now it's tempting to kind of think well

00:25:54.360 that's that's sort of uh interesting but i'm never going to see that because the roots are underground

00:25:57.640 but this is another very popular misconception because the trunk and the roots meld into each other

00:26:04.600 just above the ground so at head height we're definitely looking at the trunk and a couple of feet

00:26:08.720 underground we're definitely thinking of roots but between those two areas the trunk becomes the

00:26:14.340 roots and what that means is they start to flare out and we can see the roots in most tree families

00:26:20.660 above ground particularly close to the trunk and the simplest way to put it is if you look at the

00:26:26.460 pattern of roots around the base of a tree and if it's the first time you're doing it pick some

00:26:30.460 isolated tree that's a bit exposed to to the elements the root that is furthest from the trunk

00:26:35.800 is most likely to be on the windward side so if your winds are coming from the west that is giving

00:26:40.800 you an indication of west and that that's a technique i've been using for natural navigation for

00:26:45.360 well over a decade probably 15 years and something which is so closely related to that but i'd never

00:26:51.160 noticed is that trees are fantastic engineers they've solved so many engineering problems that it took us

00:26:57.600 you know until very recently to work out and something engineers know now is that right angles

00:27:03.160 are not great at dealing with stress that corner creates a weakness so if we imagine the tree went

00:27:08.960 down from a vertical trunk and then turn 90 degrees out to the roots you'd have a right angle and the

00:27:14.500 first strong wind it would create huge stresses there so we end up with this curve from the trunk to the

00:27:19.400 roots and this can be seen from quite a long distance actually so we don't even have to be a few

00:27:24.560 feet away from the tree looking at the roots in the ground you know just above the ground you can

00:27:28.740 actually be you know hundreds of feet even a thousand feet away from a tree and once you're

00:27:32.400 practiced you can see the curve in the base of the trunk it's what i've nicknamed in in the book the

00:27:38.200 elephant's toes if we imagine an elephant's foot we don't expect it to be a perfect cylinder and there

00:27:44.240 are indeed on an elephant's foot there's just a little curve out towards the toes and that little

00:27:48.820 curve is what we see at the base of trees when we practice looking for it let's talk about leaves

00:27:54.040 what can we learn about the environment by looking at the color and shape of either a tree's leaves or

00:27:59.740 needles if it's a conifer yeah i just find it absolutely it's wonderful it's almost miraculous

00:28:06.520 the variety there is in leaves and it's very i found it very instructive for me and i do write

00:28:12.340 about this because i think it's it's a really helpful way of understanding that that there is

00:28:16.000 nothing random in nature nature is super super competitive so the idea that that anything in the

00:28:22.340 natural world just does something because it's decorative or pretty or or different for the sake

00:28:27.960 of it it just that just not how nature works and of course when we think about it we know that

00:28:31.940 but it is kind of tempting to think well of course there's going to be lots of variety but in my world

00:28:36.920 of looking for clues and signs it's all about turning that on its head instead of sort of going well

00:28:41.460 that's just kind of nice and pretty and different and saying what is the reason for the difference and

00:28:46.120 leaves are a fantastic area to experience this because you know on a walk of half an hour we might

00:28:51.680 easily see you know dozens of different leaf shapes and colors and if we say each one of those

00:28:57.120 differences is trying to tell us something so how do we actually find the meaning well we start with

00:29:01.820 the big bold broad pattern so a big broad leaf is looking to harvest loads of light but it's very

00:29:08.920 vulnerable to tough conditions so it suits trees that shed their leaves in the winter you'll find super

00:29:14.100 broad leaves in places where trees are expecting to be in the shade so we only get tall trees and

00:29:19.760 small trees there are very few medium trees because it's a bad strategy but the smaller trees quite

00:29:25.040 often expect to get shaded so they throw out these very broad leaves a broad leaf is telling you this

00:29:29.980 is a tree that's obviously going to shed them but also is expecting lots of shade a point at the end

00:29:34.640 of a leaf a really marked point in broad leaves is telling you you're in a wet area because points

00:29:40.260 are good at channeling rainwater off a leaf rainwater is you know it's weight and stress that a leaf can do

00:29:45.560 without so anything it can do to shed that weight is good news and points at the end at the tips of

00:29:51.620 leaves are a sign you're in a wet area that's why in jungles we find lots and lots of pointed leaves

00:29:56.540 if a tree is expecting to cope with very tough conditions it has to get smaller that's why

00:30:01.600 conifers have needles not broad leaves and every single color is telling us something as well so

00:30:06.800 for example in conifers you know trees love sunlight but sunlight is damaging the radiation and sunlight is

00:30:13.040 very powerful and so so leaves have this dilemma they want the energy from the sunlight but they

00:30:17.920 have to protect themselves so sometimes on conifers you'll see a white or occasionally a blue sheen

00:30:22.880 and that's wax which is protecting the leaves and because there's more sunlight on the south side

00:30:27.960 we get more of a blue or white color on the south side and this you can see this like in a single tree

00:30:34.020 like a tree might have darker green leaves on one side compared to the other yes what what we find is

00:30:41.280 if a tree's leaves are getting enough light then the the signals in the tree are you just keep doing

00:30:47.280 what you're doing if however there are leaves on a branch and there's not enough energy coming back

00:30:52.140 the tree senses this and it changes the signal it changes the message and it changes the leaves from

00:30:57.500 sun leaves to shade leaves which means they get bigger darker because they pump in more chlorophyll

00:31:02.880 and they actually get thinner because they're effectively spreading out and what's happening here is it's a sort

00:31:07.740 of last roll of the dice so the tree is saying to to the leaves look we're going to change you to to shade

00:31:13.760 leaves but you need to really start delivering now if after um you know a season that hasn't worked

00:31:20.160 the tree changes the signal again and it'll start shutting that branch down which leads to the pruning we

00:31:25.960 talked about earlier so all the time trees are reacting to the environment changing from the leaf level

00:31:32.760 and then that in turn leads to branch changes and that's why no two trees are identical

00:31:37.380 when people often depict the seasons like they said draw a picture of the four seasons they usually

00:31:42.720 include a tree you know they'll show what a tree looks like in winter there's no leaves it's bare

00:31:46.960 spring you're starting to see the flowers blossom the leaves come on summer it's just green

00:31:51.020 leaves and then in fall the leaves change colors but you highlight the fact that trees besides those

00:31:56.880 four broad seasons they actually have hidden seasons what are those hidden seasons and what can they tell

00:32:03.060 us about that tree yeah it's a fascinating area because i think as you've highlighted there our busy

00:32:11.040 modern lives mean we tend to compartmentalize everything to simplify it which can be very helpful

00:32:16.420 but when we're reading trees we're talking about just going up a level and wanting to notice things

00:32:21.120 that have passed us by and that's where four seasons is an oversimplification so if we take spring

00:32:26.820 for example spring doesn't hit one country all at the same time we know that it won't even hit one

00:32:32.740 region at the same time so spring moves across a region but it also moves across trees so one of the

00:32:39.580 most dramatic signs you can look for is how spring starts low and moves up you'll find that there are

00:32:45.300 flowers on the ground wildflowers that come out before any of the trees come into leaf because they're

00:32:50.500 trying to steal a march they're trying to get they're trying to jump the gun almost but the smallest trees

00:32:55.540 and the lowest branches will come into leaf next and then spring moves upwards so by the time most

00:33:01.440 people are walking around going oh it's spring the the leaves are out actually we've seen two two

00:33:07.120 springs already and there are there are you know half a dozen other ones that we can see so in each

00:33:13.340 individual tree the tree is sensing the seasons in all of its growing areas so it can actually tell that

00:33:20.100 it's going to be colder near the ground because of a frost and respond to that differently so we can

00:33:25.000 actually see the seasons move almost branch by branch up a tree at the other end of the the

00:33:30.740 broadleaf growing season we we have fall and again we we sort of get used to this idea that there's this

00:33:37.420 sort of magical moment or maybe a magical two weeks where there are fantastic golden colors and reds and

00:33:42.680 things like this but actually each tree again is it's not interesting putting on a show for us

00:33:48.220 lovely when it happens but that's not the tree's aim the tree's aim is to be efficient and do things in a

00:33:53.500 practical way so what we find is that the leaves will turn at the furthest point from the roots so

00:33:59.320 the highest part of the tree but also in the warmest areas first so we find that the colors will start in

00:34:06.420 the highest southern part of a tree so it's very very common to notice fall arriving in the high

00:34:12.500 southern part of a tree weeks before in a big tree you know a couple of weeks maybe three weeks before

00:34:18.000 the low northern part of the very same tree how does a tree figure out when it needs to start

00:34:23.420 blossoming in the spring and when it needs to start shedding its leaves during the fall like what

00:34:28.580 is it looking at in the environment to figure that out the tree senses two different things it senses

00:34:34.440 the length of night we tend to think of the day as getting longer but the tree's looking at it a

00:34:38.740 different way that shorter the night the closer to the growing season the tree gets so that's the

00:34:44.380 astronomical cue and that will be the same every single year you know pretty much to within a few

00:34:50.120 hours so the tree could just base itself on the length of night and that would mean that the leaves

00:34:54.860 came out on the same day every single year which would be a tiny bit boring but it would work in one

00:35:00.000 sense but the problem is we know that spring is a tough season to call the way i put it is you know

00:35:06.240 for anybody who's ever organized an outdoor event in april we know that this is a this is a tricky thing

00:35:11.700 to call so trees could take the safety first strategy and say okay i'm just not going to put

00:35:16.780 any leaves out until the risk of frost is completely gone so let's just wait till the first of june for

00:35:21.440 example the problem then is they've lost the competition because trees that go earlier will

00:35:25.660 get lots and lots of lovely warmth and light so what trees do is they count warm hours so they're

00:35:31.560 aware of the length of night but they're also counting warm hours and this is how trees sense that winter

00:35:37.460 has been they count cold hours and then when the number of warm hours reaches a certain number

00:35:42.980 and in commercially valuable uh crops like peach for example the the science is amazing uh we know

00:35:48.960 almost to exactly to the hour how many uh hours for example a a peach cultivar like like mayflower or

00:35:55.600 something like that will need so it needs the night to get to a certain certain length shorter than a

00:36:00.900 certain number of hours and it needs x thousand hours of warmth and then it just goes right it's spring

00:36:06.380 let's get this show on but then as we've discussed it it won't do it all over the tree at exactly the

00:36:11.100 same moment that's when it starts the process in the warmest part of the tree and it'll move over

00:36:15.520 the rest of it so we we've talked about some of the signs we can look for in trees and there's lots

00:36:20.880 more in the book but i'm curious someone is listening to this episode and they want to start

00:36:24.740 reading trees like right now they walk out their door and take a walk in their neighborhood

00:36:28.880 what are like three or four things that you think are easy to start noticing and how to read a tree and

00:36:34.320 looking for signs on how to navigate the three areas i'd encourage people to look for are water

00:36:40.400 sun and wind and depending where you are in the world one or two of those you know you might get

00:36:45.440 to almost immediately but whenever you're standing anywhere near water it doesn't need to be a vast

00:36:51.220 amount of water it can be a small pond or lake if there happens to be a tree next to it just start to

00:36:56.240 notice and again we don't need the names it's fantastic that we've barely mentioned a species name

00:37:01.100 in our chat so just notice what the trees look like there and then the next time you're well

00:37:05.180 away from water just look at the trees there and if you do that a few times you're starting the

00:37:09.680 simplest practical end of map making using trees indigenous people would find it hilarious the idea 1.00

00:37:15.700 that that we find water by looking for water the trees will tell us where water is all trees are

00:37:20.680 sensitive to water so so we get things like willows close to water and lots of dry soil loving trees

00:37:25.860 further away from that but the next thing to look for is the sun changing the shape of trees so so

00:37:32.160 notice how no tree is symmetrical every single tree on planet earth of all the billions of trees there

00:37:37.420 is not one symmetrical one and just start to notice how the light is changing the patterns we get more

00:37:42.360 branches on the south side and they're slightly closer to horizontal in the broadleaf trees and

00:37:46.960 then look for wind patterns notice how trees in windy places are shorter but look at how the very top part

00:37:52.820 of the tree will quite often be bent over by any strong winds uh giving you a compass so water sun

00:37:58.840 and wind really really sort of good place to start look for those footprints and that will get you up

00:38:03.660 and running i've been looking for the uh southern eye that's the thing i've been focusing on when i'm

00:38:08.360 out in my sort of in a wooded area and yeah you see them it's interesting like sometimes they're

00:38:12.620 really small sometimes they're really big but they're there it's really cool once you once you notice

00:38:16.400 it well tristan this has been a great conversation where can people go to learn more about the book

00:38:20.220 and your work thanks how to read a tree can be ordered through all the usual places and i love

00:38:26.100 it when people support their local bookstore if that's an option for information my website natural

00:38:30.660 navigator.com has lots and lots of examples you can get a real taste for the signs you can find in

00:38:36.660 trees and indeed in nature tons and tons of information on there so uh yeah natural navigator.com

00:38:42.740 will give you lots of fun info all right well tristan gouley thanks for time it's been a pleasure

00:38:46.520 thanks so much brett really enjoyed our chat my guest today was tristan gouley he's the author of

00:38:51.880 the book how to read a tree it's available on amazon.com and bookstores everywhere you can find

00:38:55.780 more information about his work at his website natural navigator.com also check out our show notes

00:39:00.220 at aom.is read a tree where you find links to resources where you delve deeper into this topic

00:39:04.780 well that wraps up another edition of the aom podcast make sure to check out our website at

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00:39:54.240 but put what you've heard into action

00:40:02.680 so

00:40:09.360 you

00:40:13.060 you

00:40:22.500 you

00:40:23.640 Thank you.

The Art of Manliness - June 28, 2023

How to Read a Tree

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