Peter Wohlleben’s The Hidden Life of Trees

page numbers in parentheses. italics are my own questions of the text.

Chapter 5 Notes

Chapters 3 & 4 Notes

Chapter 2 Notes

Foreword, Introductions, and Chapter 1 Notes

Chapter 6 Slowly Does It

trees grow slooooooooooow

• beech

• count nodes on branches of young trees (31)

• as the branch gets longer the nodes stay behind

does this method of age determination work with other species as well?

mother trees want slow growth in their children (32)

• slow growth from light deprivation

• slow growth in young trees key to old age

slow growth in natural conditions (33)

• pencil thick trees are 80 – 120 years old

• woody cells are tiny and contain almost no air

• flexible

• resistant to breakage

• resistant to fungi

mothers deliver sugar and nutrients through root systems (34)

if tree is wider than it is tall, it is in waiting mode (34)

• waiting mode

• look like flat-topped bonsai trees (34)

• leaves (or needles) sensitive to low light

• adapted to shade

When the mother tree dies sets off a chain reaction

• falls to ground

• snaps seedlings

• only trees below that grow straight and tall make it

• meandering trees get caught in darkness again

• this darkness even darker

• more photosynthesis

• fruit becomes sweeter (35)

• attracts predatory herbivores

• honeysuckle

• winds its way around saplings

• if canopy closes honeysuckle dies off before killing trees

• neighbors of mother tree close the canopy gap (36)

• once young trees have made it to the middle story

• no longer threatened by competitors