Customer Reviews

The Tree: A Natural History of What Trees Are, How They Live, and Why They Matter

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

"I never met a Tudge I didn't like" is a fitting adage for this wide-ranging author. Having written an "unauthorised biography" of life, the impact of agriculture on human development and other works, Tudge has created a masterpiece of science writing. No longer can we claim that we can't "see the woods for the trees" since he has detailed the mechanics of both in exquisite detail. At) least so far as we know now. If nothing else is clear from this book, what we don't know about the mechanisms of trees far exceeds what we've learned. Trees, so ubiquitous in their presence and so meaningful in our lives, remain a great mystery to be solved. In three almost independent segments, he spells out what is known and what needs to be revealed.

He opens with one of the most understated definitions in science writing: "a tree is a big plant with a stick up the middle". From this simplistic opening, he then develops an image of how complex that "stick" and "plant" combination is in the final product. This complexity didn't appear from nowhere - the author explains how evolution built it from simple beginnings. Most readers will be familiar with the fact that 46 chromosome are needed to make a human. Trees, through various mechanisms, may develop hundreds of chromosomes depending on conditions. The structure of a single tree almost pales against the variety of trees growing around our planet. Tall trees, spreading ones, trees that we often call "shrubs" - which are merely superbly adapted to their local environment - all reflect the immense diversity trees have developed over the ages. Although generally divided into but two forms, conifers and "flowering" trees, they comprise thousands of species, many probably still unknown.

Tudge dedicates the second part of his book to descriptions of those variations. It is a catalogue of wonders as he depicts the oaks, beeches and other "common" types along with palms, celery pines and fruit trees. He begins with the ancient conifers, trees with a lineage stretching back nearly three hundred million years. That heritage shows in the varieties the conifers incorporate. From stately pines to humble ground-huggers, the conifers even include a parasitic member among their ranks. Angiosperms, the "flowering" trees, have surpassed the conifers in species number. The author lists each Order, with a list of the families and species. He explains why the numbers of species are in flux as new information about relationships comes to light. Tree habitats are also described with indications of where to find typical specimens.

In last third of the book: "How Trees Live", Tudge demonstrates why he's one of today's leading science writers. He has accumlated a vast repetoire of information, and presents it with almost passionate style. Seemingly static from our viewpoint, trees have much to do in the course of their lives. They must keep the sun in view, and many forests are competitive arenas to lift leaves into the light. There are seasons to keep track of, predators to discourage and to entice and employ helpers in the process of reproduction. Lacking brains, or other "intelligent" means, trees cannot manufacture devices for these needs. All must be accomplished with chemistry. Much of "the secret life of trees" is hidden here. With but five hormones and a handful of pigments to achieve their tasks, they have built up forms and methods to accomplish it all with an astounding degree of success.

Tudge's adulation of trees goes beyond being simply informative. In his conclusion, he both endorses our need to increase our knowledge of trees and warns of the effects of our failure to do so. We may view trees as aesthetically pleasing or as a source of lumber or paper. Either way, we must deal with them properly. Hewing down vast forests does far more than leave a barren landscape. Trees are the source of the oxygen we breathe. They take up the carbon dioxide our society produces in such imposing quantities. Their capacity for that role has likely been exceeded at this point. Trees matter, he argues, and we need to know why and how. This book is an excellent starting point to find the answers to that learning quest. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]

One of the most beloved and memorable of all popular poems is Joyce Kilmer's 'Trees' " I think that I shall never see/ a poem as lovely as a tree'/ A tree whose hungry mouth is prest/ against the earth's sweet flowing breast/.
The sheer wonder, delight, and inspiration 'Trees' give to our poetic nature is only one side of what they are.
In this learned and detailed study of Trees,Colin Tudge tells us more about them than we might ever have wanted to know. He describes the different species, provides a survival guide to the way Trees manage in often challenging environments, considers the special qualities of different kinds of trees, helps us understand how Trees are a benefit not only to the 'natural world' but to human civilization and society.
He does this as he also points out the new dangers facing various species from global- warming. And he has specific recommendations on how we can better create an environment more beneficial to the natural world as a whole.
The book is disappointingly poor in one element most of its readers will certainly want to have, good illustrations of Trees. But it nonetheless is an overall encyclopediac treasure for those for whom one of the natural world's great stars are an ongoing source of interest and attraction.

...but only an environment can make a tree. The necessary adaptation of plants to their environment, which makes some of them shape themselves as trees, is one of Colin Tudge's central points in this immense study of the evolutionary history of trees, of their fantastically complicated taxonomy, of their "life styles" as stationary but highly active organisms, and of their place in a world increasingly managed by a species of primate whose origins were arboreal.

As other reviewers have noted, The Tree has three distinct trunks. The first 86 pages - What Is a Tree? - answers its own question by stating that "a tree is a big plant with a pole in the middle". Later the author continues: "...there are many lineages of trees--quite separate evolutionary lines that have nothing to do with each other except that they are all plants...'Tree' is not a distinct category like 'dog' or 'horse,' It's just a way of being a plant." Thus it seems, the concept of 'tree' is more of a Platonic form than a solid scientific classification. Tudge continues to discuss the convergent evolution of trees in terms of their competitive adaptation to specific environments. I believe he would agree with me that the 'specific' is most often the root of the 'species.'

The second section of the book - All the Trees in the World, 160 pages - is an exhaustive and exhausting catalog of the families, genera, and species of trees world-wide. Unless you are the kind of reader who finds taxomony more entertaining than table tennis, this plethora of info may blur in your mind and you may abandon the book before the final section. That would be a shame, since the final section is by far the most interesting. The good news is that you can vault over the trees without losing your way in the forest. In other words, I recommend reading the first and last portions of the book, and saving the middle third for occasions when you want information about certain species.

The third portion of the book - two sections, The Life of Trees & Trees and Us - is the most exciting and could effectively stand alone. No longer focusing on "what" a tree is, Prof. Tudge examines "how" a tree is - that is, how various species of trees sprout, grow, interact, and reproduce. What a wealth of observations he presents! This reader, for instance, has walked under kerchillions of tree without ever noting that conifers buttress their heavy limbs by adding wood from under the bough, while flowering trees buttress by adding wood above the fork. I rushed to the nearest mixed forest after reading that, and by Odin, it's true!

The final chapter discusses the importance of trees to human societies, past, present, and future. Prof. Tudge correctly assumes that trees can and must play a major role in the approaching crisis of anthropogenic global warming. Not only are trees very effective sequesterers of carbon while living, and not only does the destruction of forest release huge volumes of carbon into the atmosphere, but also the main product of trees - wood - could with proper foresight play a huge role in managing and slowing down global warming. Wood used for construction sequesters carbon just as effectively as living wood in the forest. There is one tree or another, according to Tudge, that can produce practical materials for almost any construction need, even including modest skyscrapers, and can replace almost any plastic. Furthermore, cultivation of trees could beneficially replace sugar, tobacco, cotton, and other economically inefficient crops, especially in currently destitute regions like Cuba, North Dakota, and the Sahel. There is a tree that could thrive in nearly every environment, since diverse environments have already produced the fantastic diversity of trees.

Tudge is to nature writing what the late, Nobel Laureate, Jorge Luis Borges, was to literature; he examines every aspect of a topic, turning it over until his examination is complete, and leaving no stone, or in this case leaf, unturned. And doing so with wit and style in a way no one else could.

This is the longest book length tome on natural history I've seen just devoted to trees, and it contains a huge amount of information, enough to put off the casual reader. For example, don't listen to the two negative reviews, they should have started with a beginning book on trees as Tudge's book is just too advanced. Tudge knows his audience well, which is that of already learned and literate natural history buffs, and trying this book before laying the groundwork is like trying to learn calculus without first learning algebra and trigonometry.

But I don't need to defend Tudge as his accomplishments speak for themselves. Overall, this is probably the most detailed piece of expository writing on trees ever done, outside of formal dendrology texts, which aren't nearly as readable (I know, I've read them). If you love trees and want to learn more about their biology, classification, and ecology, there is no more enjoyable way to do it than with this book, and it is probably destined to become a masterpiece and classic of the nature genre.

Here Colin Tudge packs into one volume enough information on trees to fill several dozen field guides and botany textbooks, all within an accessible natural history. It's a very ambitious endeavor that mostly rewards the reader handsomely, notwithstanding some readability issues raised by that very same wealth of knowledge. Tudge starts the book by asking "What is a Tree?" and the answer is far more complex and enlightening than even lifetime tree lovers would expect. But when Tudge moves into descriptions of the world's arboreal bounty, trouble arises. It's tough to pack so much information into one book without under-explaining the items you choose to cover and being forced to delete other items that are just as worthy. That's the main problem with the middle portion of the book - an often fascinating but ultimately tiresome slog through a few hundred different orders of trees and their representative species. An overload of Latin terminology and brief descriptions march by in a fashion that makes you appreciate the enormous diversity of the world's trees, but also makes you wonder if more specific field guides would be a better way to learn more about a smaller number of trees depending on one's personal interests.

Fortunately, the book is saved by the third and fourth parts, in which Tudge explores the lives of trees in relation to each other, the natural world, and us. Of course, Tudge is prone to fanciful tangents and an over-reliance on rhetorical questions, and there's not much new to the final chapter's coverage of worldwide environmental and social problems. Regardless, the book closes with a very insightful discussion of how humanity needs trees, in many different ways, and this ultimately makes the book a success for the patient and passionate reader. [~doomsdayer520~]

Honestly I vascillated between 4 and 5 stars for this book, settling on 5 starts because it is so thorough. However, there are places where it reads like a text and would be difficult for the average reader to follow. However, with that said, I first can tell you that I doubt any loves trees as much as Colin Tudge. The breadth and depth of his knowledge is impeccable and his writing is almost like a love letter to nature. Except for those scientific places I mentioned earlier this is one of those books you'll want to read carefully...and don't be afraid of going back to re-read something. Appreciating just what a tree is and what it does is incredible, especially when we generally take them for granted.

I've been sort of collecting books on trees the last few months. Though still an amateur on the subject, this book is a winner from where I sit. An I-can't-put-it-down book that makes me happy I'm only half way through right now.

If you are interested in understanding the flora around you and you aren't already degreed in botany but kinda would like to be, this book is for you!

Always celebrating trees but never retreating into any kind of mysticism or excess of poetry, the author of this book gives the reader an interesting as well as exciting overview of the classification and biology of trees. For the most part the author remains scientific in his dialog, even though he sometimes has mistaken notions about some concepts. For example, he asserts that the theory of chaos (which is subset of the mathematical theory of dynamical systems) holds that some systems are 'innately' unpredictable. This however is not what the theory really asserts, but rather that the 'phase space' of a system, which is essentially the collection of its possible paths or trajectories, is very sensitive to the initial conditions that are chosen. Such systems are very complex (at least visually) but they are not 'unpredictable' as the author asserts. The author though understands fully the rigors of scientific thought, it being much more sophisticated than "common sense" reasoning and sometimes requiring long periods of time and sizable financial commitments. This is refreshing, since towards the end of the book he discusses climate change and the advantages that trees could bring as a strategy to address it.

At least for this reviewer, the most difficult part of the book was Part II, since this part emphasized the classifications of trees, and can be dry reading at times, in spite of its importance. With some perseverance one can trudge through the pages, and be pleasantly surprised along the way because of the interesting facts about trees that are found. For example, it turns out that India does not have any native conifers, that avocado has a sophisticated strategy to prevent inbreeding, that there are over 2600 species of palm trees, and that aspirin is derived from salicin, which is found in the bark of willow trees. Things get much more interesting in Part III, where the biology, metabolism, and growth dynamics of trees are discussed.

Surprisingly, the author leaves out any discussion of the genetic engineering of trees, a topic that is not only fascinating in itself, but also controversial. This is especially the case for the creation of transgenic trees, which can be used for phytoremediation, a cheaper method for producing ethanol or lowering lignin content. The latter would be very useful for the paper industry, because of the expense involved in separating cellulose from lignin. A natural place in the book to discuss genetically modified trees would be in the last part of the book, wherein the author discusses their social importance. Some trees, namely Sebertia acuminata, as the author points out, are able to grow in soils rich in metals such as nickel, and even accumulate them in fairly sizable amounts. Given the electrical conductivity of nickel, and given the ultrafast switching (excitonic) processes that occur in photosynthesis, it may not be farfetched to think that the use of genetic engineering and other technological tools could produce a tree that is also a computer.

Note:This book was read and studied between the dates of Jan 2011 and May 2011.

This book is a treasure for anyone, lay person or professional, who loves trees or is merely fascinated with the amazing forms of life that trees are. But it is more than that. Colin Tudge is not only an expert on trees, he is an evolutionary biologist of the first water, as can be learned from reading just this book, and as can be discerned by looking at a list of the books he has published. Here's an example of his deep understanding of biology:

"In truth, the essence of life is metabolism--the interplay of different molecules to form a series of self-renewing chemical feedback loops that go around and around and around. And they do this simply because, chemistry being what it is, such a modus operandi is chemically possible, and what is possible sometimes happens." (p. 58)

And I might add, given enough time, what is possible probably will happen.

Here's another (the book is filled with deep insights into the nature of life): while speaking of the nitrogen-fixing Frankia (compared to the more common nitrogen fixing Rhizobium) as "yet another, stunning case of convergent evolution," he adds that we see "yet again, the propensity of organisms--one might almost say their eagerness--to cooperate." (p. 187)

The book is in four parts:

Part I "What Is a Tree?" consists of four chapters describing and explaining how a tree functions and how trees are constructed and why they behave the way they do. Additionally, Tudge shows how trees differ from grasses, herbs, shrubs, etc.

Part II "All the Trees in the World," is taxonomy, six dense chapters giving the nomenclature, scientific names and descriptions of the trees, where they grow, how plentiful they are, and how they evolved from earlier types and became distributed the way they are. Tudge includes some chat about differences of opinions among botanists; he shares some history and anecdotes while somehow managing to make the naming and classification of orders, classes, families, genera, species, etc., interesting. I was surprised to learn (amateur that I am) that trees can have a familial relationship to herbs and vegetables such as with legumes.

Part III "The Life of Trees" has three chapters and concentrates on the ecology of trees, how they are pollinated and how they get their sees distributed and how they interact with symbionts, parasites, and mutualists. Included is an interesting section on figs and their unique wasp pollinators. The effect of fire and grazing is discussed.

Part IV "Trees and Us," contains a single chapter, "The Future with Trees," in which Tudge argues persuasively for "agroforestry," which is the simultaneous use of land for both growing trees and other agricultural products, including cows (who appreciate the shade) and free range chickens (who appreciate the cover), and pigs (who appreciate the acorns in oak woodlands), and smaller trees, like coffee trees (which give a better bean because of the shade). With the disadvantages of monoculture (disease, heavy reliance on fossil fuel fertilizers, economic hardships for many, riches for the few, etc.) becoming more and more apparent, agroforestry is a huge step in the right direction.

I would recommend that the reader begin with Part I "What Is a Tree?" but then skip to Parts III and IV "The Life of Trees," and "Trees and Us," and only then delve into nomenclatural thickets of Part II "All the Trees in the World."

There are some exquisite black and white line drawings of trees by Dawn Burford scattered throughout the text.

Back matter includes "Notes and Further Reading," a glossary and an index.

This is the first of Colin Tudge's books that I have read. It won't be the last.

As a nature writer myself, I'm always thrilled to come upon another writer in the genre, one new to me, whose work has the same effect on me as a plunge in a mountain stream. It washes the cobwebs out of my brain, leaves me feeling small and humble, and opens up new avenues of thinking. Colin Tudge's masterful, concise, and grandly entertaining book on trees is this kind of book. The marvel of it for me is how Tudge can take so much hard science and make it riveting. I have no doubt that Tudge is one of the greatest nature writers ever. Bravo, bravo, bravo!