yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

How Trees Secretly Talk to Each Other in the Forest | Decoder


2m read
·Nov 11, 2024

Ouch! What do you think you’re doing? The idea of talking trees has been capturing the human imagination for generations. Did you say something? My bark is worse than my bite.

Okay, so maybe they don’t talk to us, but it turns out, trees can “talk” to each other. The trees are speaking to each other. But that does beg the question: What do trees have to talk about? And can we learn to speak their language?

Underneath the soil, a vast and interconnected network of life links the trees through their root systems. But, they can’t talk to each other without help. The whole process starts with hub trees—the oldest and tallest trees in the forest. Hub trees have greater access to sunlight, and through the process of photosynthesis, end up producing more sugar than they actually need.

Underground, fungi need sugar to survive. Most of their bodies are made up of a mass of threads called “mycelium.” They grow within the root system of trees to absorb the excess sugar. In return, the mycelium provides the tree with the nutrients it needs from the soil. This symbiotic relationship is known as mycorrhiza, which stems from the Greek words for fungus and root.

These tree-fungi relationships connect the trees in the forest together, forming an underground communication network to exchange water and nutrients, to nurture their seedlings, and even send warning signals when under threat. So, how many trees are really talking to each other?

To get a better picture of these forest relationships, a team of researchers used DNA analysis to map a fungal network in a patch of Canadian forest. Remarkably, they found that one tree was connected to 47 other trees! Their models also showed that when hub trees were removed, it would cause more connections to be lost than if trees were simply removed randomly.

Studying these kinds of underground exchanges will play a vital role in creating stronger, more resilient forests for the future. So, even though we might not be able to “talk” to trees, at least we can still keep trying to understand their language. Who knows what they might say?

More Articles

View All
Don’t Buy A Home In 2023 (Sellers Panicking)
Americans are leaving California and New York in droves. People are getting fed up and moving to Arizona, Nevada, Texas, or Florida. The main reason why is money. What’s up, Graham? It’s guys here. So for the first time ever, the housing market is being c…
Causes and Effects of Climate Change | National Geographic
Human activities, from pollution to overpopulation, are driving up the Earth’s temperature and fundamentally changing the world around us. The main cause is a phenomenon known as the greenhouse effect. Gases in the atmosphere, such as water vapor, carbon…
Warren Buffett: How to Invest in the Stock Market in 2021
There were at least 2,000 companies that entered the auto business because it clearly had this incredible future. And of course, you remember that in 2009, there were three left, two of which went bankrupt. So there is a lot more to picking stocks than fi…
Khan Academy Ed Talks with Chase Nordengren, PhD
Hello and welcome to Ed Talks with Khan Academy, where we talk to interesting and important people in the education space. I’m Kristen Deservo, the Chief Learning Officer here at Khan Academy, and looking forward to a conversation today with Dr. Chase Nor…
Photosynthesis evolution | Cellular energetics | AP Biology | Khan Academy
[Instructor] In this video, we are going to talk about the evolution of photosynthesis on Earth because that’s the only place that, at least so far, we’re aware of photosynthesis occurring. I personally believe that it’s occurring in many places in the un…
Rediscovering Youth on the Colorado River | Short Film Showcase
[Music] When I was born in the summer of ‘86, my dad wrote me these words: “The important places, child of mine, come as you grow. In youth you will learn the secret places: the cave behind the waterfall, the arms of the oak that hold you high, the stars…