#the cognition of nonhuman creatures! the complete unfamiliarity of it all! the fact that we can relate anyway!
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serialreblogger · 4 years ago
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“#ask-me-about-tree-societies” tell me about tree societies?
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hello i love y’all so while i procrastinate on homework lemme answer a thing
SO
((Source disclaimer: For convenience’s sake, I’m gonna be sourcing most of my info from “The Hidden Life of Trees” by Peter Wohlleben unless otherwise linked. It’s a comprehensively researched, thoroughly sourced work, so by and large I’m inclined to agree with a lot of the theories it puts forward. That said, remember kids, all decent research has multiple sources to back it up! Everything you read comes from somewhere, so make sure the places you’re getting your information are credible ones with primary sources/field research to support them))
Fact 1: Beech trees that naturally grow near each other are almost always interdependent on one another for nutrients. (They aren’t the only ones that have been documented doing this, either.) This is so ingrained in their biology that felled trees (with no leaves, and therefore no chlorophyll to convert sunlight into nutrients) can live on for hundreds of years, because trees in their community give them the necessary sugars by interlinking their roots and transferring nutrients back and forth.
It’s not an accident, either; trees, like all plants, can differentiate their own roots from those of others around them. It’s a deliberate strategy on the part of trees: sharing nutrients to promote communal survival.
Arguably, this supports the argument that trees are, at the very least, capable of adopting social behaviours.
(Interestingly, tree farms of the same species don’t display these behaviours. Possibly the roots are too damaged by the planting process to initiate nutrient exchange, although trees tend to be quite effective at rebounding from nonlethal physical trauma. Another theory is that the artificially shortened lifespans and high death rate of farmed trees render such communal interdependence more harmful than advantageous. If anything, though, I’d hazard to say that this is a point in favour of trees as adaptive social creatures, which would make them more complex than, say, colony insects, which operate primarily instinctively and form communities roughly the same way, no matter what conditions a species is exposed to.)
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Fact 2: Trees, and many other plants, do experience pain. You could, if you like, define pain in such a way as to exclude plants (or, with equal ease, non-human animals), but the fact remains that when the living tissue of a plant is damaged, it releases chemicals and sends out electrical signals indicating that damage has been done. The main difference is that for plants, pain signals travel more slowly. For a non-tree-related exploration of plant responses to threatening stimuli, check out the shrinking mimosa pudica:
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The interesting point here, though, is that trees don’t just send pain signals internally. When some trees are damaged, they release scent compounds from their leaves as well as chemical signals sent through symbiotic fungal networks connecting trees by the roots, effectively communicating a distress signal (sometimes a very specific one; “help my roots are being eaten by fungus” is different from “help my leaves are being eaten by caterpillars”). Other trees in the vicinity are prompted to initiate their own defense responses. Given the slow nature of plant life (or, if you like, the needs associated with living in a world full of predators with super-speed), this is a hugely beneficial adaptation to have; such signals might not do anything to protect the individual tree, but they’re essential tactics for the preservation of the collective community of trees.
Fact 3: Albino redwoods.
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Scraggly things, albino redwoods. They don’t possess the chlorophyll they’d need to survive, which is why you don’t see a lot of albino plants. And yet.
Most of the literature defines albino redwoods as parasitic, which imo is the height of ableist eugenic stupidity but I digress (INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS OF A SPECIES CAN’T BE PARASITES OF THEIR OWN SPECIES THAT’S NOT HOW THIS WORKS whatever! whatever). Albino redwoods, unlike other depigmented plants, survive by feeding on the nutrients shared with them by their parent trees. Like the long-felled beeches kept alive by their fellow trees’ root systems, albino redwoods are wholly dependent on the community around them for survival. And still, they survive.
What’s more, once scientists got done demonizing a literal tree for having a disability, they figured out something really interesting. Albino redwoods are most common in polluted areas. Know what albino redwoods also do? Stockpile heavy metals. They act as lightning rods for the harmful pollutants in the soil, storing up pollutants in their system and leaving a cleaner environment for the other trees to thrive in.
Again, there are a few possible reasons for this fascinating little coincidence (is albinism as a genetic mutation just more likely to be caused in redwoods upon exposure to pollutants? do redwood trees only support the survival of albino offspring during times of hardship, so that the community as a whole can thrive more easily in the decrease of heavy metal exposure? Would the latter qualify as a deliberate survival tactic, and if so, how the heck would a tree come to that conclusion?), but regardless of the cause, it’s yet another clear indication of the true nature of trees.
I’m not saying they’re intelligent beings. I’m saying they’re social ones.
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