A Tale of Thirty Three Trees

By Sylva

A TALE OF THIRTY THREE TREES

If you go down to the woods today

You’re sure of a big surprise

If you go down to the woods today

You’d better go in disguise

For every tree that ever you knew

Will be gathered there for certain

Because today’s the day all these trees

Will tell their tales so Sylvan

Tales of good and bad times

Prompted by sunny and shivery times

Tales of flood and drought

From which trees can hardly clear out

Tales of viruses, bacteria and mistletoe

That so often act as friend or foe

Tales of darkest dangers and sad times

Tales of brightest joy and happy times

If you go into this book today

You’re sure of a big surprise

If you read through its leaves today

You’ll be sure to become so wise

• Language: English
• Publisher: Austin Macauley Publishers
• Release date: Feb 2, 2024
• ISBN: 9781398451193

Book preview

About the Author

Sylva is a forester who has over 40 years’ experience working with trees and their environment in every which way. This included forest research, forest management and environmental impact assessment in a range of countries. It also included establishing and interpreting nature trails in numerous forests. He is concerned for the future of a world is rapidly losing much of its tree cover.

Dedication

Dedicated to more than three trillion trees now in existence on planet Earth and more than three trillion trees exterminated and otherwise deceased over the last 70 years.

Copyright Information ©

Sylva 2024

The right of Sylva to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by the author in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publishers.

Any person who commits any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

The story, experiences, and words are the author’s alone.

A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library.

ISBN 9781398431683 (Paperback)

ISBN 9781398451193 (ePub e-book)

www.austinmacauley.co.uk

First Published 2024

Austin Macauley Publishers Ltd®

1 Canada Square

Canary Wharf

London

E14 5AA

Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts; they preach undeterred by particulars the ancient law of life. Herman Hesse.

Thought is a keystone to all of creation. In this world, a stream of thought becomes the font, the essence and the most vibrant impetus for life. The primary driving force of all trees is founded on a wellspring of thought.

Trees have always known that the force is with them.

Through the leaves of this book, the thoughts of one very special community of trees have been disclosed. And so you are invited to read the leaves and share in tales thought through from the point of view of trees.

Nowhere in this world is entirely safe. Even the cosiest and most tranquil of hidden valleys can be invaded by life-threatening forces. Normally, a haven of peace and contentment for plants and animals, just such a secluded valley was even now being faced with a fearful and all too deadly menace. As in so many cases where destruction was visited upon nature, it was as a result of human intervention. The angry buzz of a chain saw filled the whole area with its dreaded vibrations and ominous death rhythms. Every tree feared this more than any other vibration that they had ever experienced. At first, they had not known which of them, or even if all of them, were to be the victims of its brutal cuts. People with their implements of death had come to this special place, early in the morning and, not for the first time, violated its peace and tranquillity with their murderous intent.

It turned out it was a solitary elm which they were intent on cutting and removing. This old fellow who, in his time, was much admired and liked among the trees of this place had sadly lost most of his life force and been reduced to a gaunt shell of his former self. He had succumbed to a lethal disease where a death-dealing fungus had invaded the egg-laying chambers of an insect and spread throughout the unfortunate tree. The old giant had succumbed quite quickly to the rampaging invader but despite the obvious demise of his main stem and branches, there was still some lingering signs of life. Even now, small shoots were springing up from the base of the old stem suggesting that re-growth could restore and rejuvenate life in the long-suffering tree. These people, much to the chagrin of the surrounding trees, had another plan. After cutting up the stem and branch wood of the old growth, they used the mechanical claw of a digger to gouge out the upper portion of the root structure and carry it away. As far as these people were concerned, there would not be a second chance for this awkward tree. Reduced now, as they would have it, to little more than a memory! Ulla, for that is who he was to his fellow trees, appeared to have run out of lives. There was no tree more disturbed by the demise of the unfortunate Ulla than his nearest neighbour, a huge and always caring giant oak.

This mighty oak at the centre of a grove of trees was in many ways an awe-inspiring figure to most of the other trees. He was big, strong and full of both wisdom and knowledge and hence respected by all. In fact, this respect didn’t just come from other trees but extended also to many of the plants and animals in his noble presence. While nature could be very competitive and cruel, it could also allow for a degree of cooperation, nurture and even friendship. There was universal recognition of this oak as a caring presence at the heart of this place. The last descendent of a ring of his kind in the centre of a long valley, he was conscious of responsibility towards all life in this spot. Most especially, he saw himself as a guardian of the life and wellbeing of what had always been regarded as a sacred place.

Fiach, for that was the oak’s name, was the last known descendent of his kind in the area. Ever since he could make sense of thought and memory, he felt a compulsion to collect and thought stories to all the living beings in his immediate vicinity. Perhaps it was his destiny to do this and thus ensure that the knowledge and wisdom bound up in a myriad of legends was known about and passed on. Perhaps it was just instinctive for him to communicate with any and all receptive entities in the surrounding natural world.

As communication is central to much of what this tale is all about forms of communicating within the plant world deserve an explanation. A thought passed from one plant to another is the normal way of passing on information within the plant world. The closer the relationship between the types of plant involved more likely the thought transfer has been an effective, efficient and quick form of communication. In addition, the proximity of one plant to another is a factor in the quality of the message; usually the closer the plants are to each other the better the quality of any consequent communication. Trees are generally good at communicating by thought and although the best links are usually within and between their own kind, many have little problem in communicating with other types of trees. A difficult concept to grasp is that leaves and roots and for that matter, all different parts of any tree can have quite distinct thought processes and interests. A considerable amount of the thought interaction going on at any one time can be within the tree itself. Roots tend to have a more grounded outlook on life and the many dilemmas it poses whereas leaves can be flightier and less calculated in their thinking. Perhaps this is because one is less likely to be around as long as the other or perhaps it is because they operate in quite different environments. Often the roots of one tree are happier communicating with the roots of another than with their own fellow tree leaves.

Now to complicate the issue of communication further, memories play a very important role in the life of trees. Memory passed on from one generation to the next is a very strong guiding and stabilising force within all trees. What is memory, after all, but thoughts from the past. Thoughts and memories can sometimes become entangled and confused and trees, especially older ones, often end up in a quandary discriminating between both. In addition, trees can often get mixed up deciphering memories of their own previous generations as memory recall can sometimes be quite erratic and often as not, misplaced. Yes, memory was all very well if you got the sequencing right, but it was just that often the older the tree became the more jumbled up the memories could become. Discriminating between thoughts and memories and the appropriate interpretation and use of each is part of any tree’s maturing process. So, at times, just simple thoughts and more complex memories could get mixed up and cause confusion. This is more likely to happen when the tree is either very young or quite old. Healthy mature trees are invariably good communicators, with strong memory links to the past not hampering clear present thoughts.

At times, Fiach liked to reminisce and remind himself of his origins. This was especially the case in more recent times. He had become increasingly concerned that he could be the last of a sap line that stretched back a very long way. He took a pride in and comfort from his long lineage. Indeed, his memories could roll back over the countless seed cycles that he and his forebears had experienced down through the ages. Countless seeds had been lost for just one to get through the many barriers that nature had invariably placed in their way. In the fullness of time, however slowly these seeds had moved over the years this movement had been ceaseless. He recalled how he and his ancestors had responded to major changes in the climate using their little seed capsules to serve as their escape hatches. Oak seed had moved north to south in advance of a great ice sheet as it pushed its way south and later back north again as it had retreated. If his memories represented a stream of continuous thought, then these seeds represented a stream of continuous movement. These recollections allowed him to put what he could call home and living place into perspective. He often recalled the moving example of this memory stream to those of his fellow trees who were being a bit precious about others that were not native to the area. In his own case, were he and his ancestors originally at home in this area and after a long trip away had now only recently returned? Or perhaps could the place his forbears had migrated to be his true home and now he was merely on a prolonged visit to this place. By the way, recent in tree terms can of course cover millennia. Tree travel generally takes place using seed as the prime mover. It can take many seeding generations to move a relatively short distance. As a human, you must try to understand these slow movements over long time periods to gain an understanding of how tree’s function in terms of relocation. Individual humans can move about so quickly and easily that they find it difficult to believe that trees ever move. The time capsules that seeds provide allow this to happen in the fullness of time.

A seed can wait a very long time to take its opportunity for converting its life force into something as complex as a tree. Just how long Fiach had waited he could not recall. Indeed, his recollections of this time were always very clouded and jumbled. Certainly, one overriding memory was just how pent up and claustrophobic his thoughts and feelings had become as he had waited in his little seed time capsule. Life had obviously not been eliminated in the listless state he had entered and whereas he had little memory of the time spent waiting he certainly had strong memories of his awakening and surge towards a new life form. He never knew whether it was heat or cold, fire or frost which had triggered this awakening. It was just the shocking immediacy of it that he could always remember. And the joy! He delighted in the unbridled joy of bursting into a new life. He could go through this experience a thousand times (and probably had) and still not tire of it. The explosive surge in feelings that comes with seed awakening was so exciting and uplifting. Everything seemed to happen at once as thoughts, chemicals, throbbing electrons and a myriad of prearranged signals acted in what seemed like a chaotic but yet had to be an orderly symphony. Memory recall suggested it followed the same sequence every time, same chaos, the same jumble of feelings and eventually the same positive result. Fortunately in his case, in that of the thousands of seeds produced by his parent tree, he appeared to be the lucky one. The only one to have made it through the series of life-threatening hurdles that nature had put in his way. The experiences gained had all been factors in moulding him into the fully formed tree that he had now become.

There is an ebb and flow to the continuous movement of seeds over time. This is the way trees have travelled over the ages and it is fitting that memory links with the ancients go through these little capsules of hope and potential. Fiach never tires of relaying his memorable tales of migration and travel to other trees around him and in return has been rewarded with their stories. Perhaps the bigger the tree the more extensive the memory recall. Certainly, his own tales always seem very entertaining and invariably more interesting. Then again, he would think that! Wouldn’t he! He could never count modesty as one of his main attributes. Still, Fiach had always felt this to be a strength rather than a weakness; after all, he and his kind had given so much to this world over the ages.

The grass at this time of the year was especially verdant and lively. The trees could hardly ever remember such an incessant cacophony of thoughts as these quirky but at times irritating little plants were giving off. Not that the trees could ever really understand the subtleties of the thought patterns of these irritating little plants all around them. Fiach found their thought patterns a mystery which he felt wasn’t worth solving. Truthfully, he had to confess that this really had always been the case. After all! What concern could their inconsequential thoughts be for any tree? Much more important for him were signs of his advancing years. As one of the oldest trees in the grove, he was finding that many of his branches as well as losing vitality were also declining in their memory retention. This contrasted with the halcyon days of his youth when these branches would jostle and joust with each other incessantly through the traditional wisdom and tree lore of his kind. Now some of these branches and in turn their latest set of leaves couldn’t quite recall which generation of oak they were. Still, on the positive side of things, his leaves were invariably happy and full of positive and lively thoughts. Perhaps because his leaves were so transient in life they would never get clogged up with memories which could often lead to more sombre thoughts. In contrast to his own lively leaves, he found that those of his near neighbour, Cumann, seemed quite often morose and sullen.

Very close to Fiach in both size and girth was Cumann, the powerful ash, who sat close to him but on the opposite side of a path. The presence of this path ensured the roots of the two giant trees could never touch each other. Cumann, for his part, believed he was the most influential tree in the area. He may not be the tallest or largest tree or even most long-living, but he believed as an inheritor of the timeless legacy of guardian trees of the earth, he was the chief sentinel of this unique place. As a self-styled custodian of the area, he was forever preening himself and constantly thought in an overweening way that annoyed many of the other trees. Most of them thought that if any tree deserved this title, it should be none other than his near neighbour, Fiach. Not, of course, that any of them would ever admit to subscribing to such elitist thoughts. Cumann seemed to take a particular delight in recounting ancient history to the trees which were not long in the area. This would have been more interesting and educational for them if it weren’t accompanied by the implication that this somehow meant that they were inferior trees. Inferior trees, by Cumann’s definition, could never truly belong to any forest’s elite. Even though none of these trees had any desire to play a leading role in life here, they nevertheless resented the supercilious attitude of the lofty ash.

Cumann had indeed been in this place long before many of the other trees had been planted or seeded. He was proud of the fact that he had not been planted by people but had grown from seed. He was one in a million, literally! In his early years, most of his fellow seeds had very little chance of becoming established as young trees. And of those that did very few survived the ravages of the weather and most especially aggressive plants and animals which had all but wiped out the remainder of his vulnerable relatives. There was an acceptance by him and all the other trees that this was the natural order of life, and that if many of his kind were to survive those first early perilous years, it could only lead to trouble, strife and grief at a later stage. No tree easily accepted elimination or death, so the inevitable infighting would have been very painful. The strongest innate instinct that any life form possesses is one of self-preservation. The battle for survival with one’s own relatives was invariably very demanding. Indeed, Cumann still had uncomfortable memories from the harsh battles he was forced to engage in to ensure he was the only one of his kind to survive in this spot.

These early years had, indeed, been hard years for the youthful Cumann and more often than not it appeared he must lose the battle for survival.