Teaching the Trees

Things of This World

132 You should try my game sometime, of identifying the trees in a forest by looking down instead of up. You may be surprised to find that it’s easy to identify trees that way; all the evidence you need is within reach. The forest floor is a through-the-looking-glass reflection of the trees above. Live above, dead below. The dead matter consists of old leaves, needles, flowers, seedpods, and branches shed by the trees. This debris may seem like useless waste until you comprehend the circle of life and realize that without this decaying waste there would be no living forest. The live trees shed their dead parts; these are decomposed by the many living things in the humus: fungi, bacteria, worms, insects; and the nutrients released in that process are available to the trees again. Ever notice that forest trees grow beautifully without anyone fertilizing them? They fertilize themselves with Things of This World 133 their own rain of debris. It’s that phoenix again: life rising out of the ashes. Squat down and touch the debris on the forest floor. Feel, in Thoreau’s words, “the solid earth! the actual world! the common sense! Contact! Contact!”1 Look at what this ground layer is composed of; it will probably be different where you are, but in this spot there are a lot of pine needles. Pick up the needles and see that they are about six inches long and in bundles of three needles each—they are from loblolly pines. Look around; you will see some pinecones scattered on the forest floor. The cones will take much longer than the needles to decompose, but they too will eventually be broken down and return their nutrients to the living trees.There will be other things on the forest floor too.What are those small tan, dry, lightweight, comma-shaped things? You may already know that they are the pollen-producing cones from the pine: the “male” cones. They shed their yellow pollen in the early spring and then drop to the ground where they, too, will decompose. In this forest, scattered in among the pine parts, are leaves that were shed in the fall by the forest’s deciduous trees: maple, oak, beech, hickory, gum. After you have touched and identified the things in the top layer, gently move that layer aside. Beneath the layer of recognizable parts is a darker, damper layer. You can still see pine needles, but they are not in bundles anymore, they are in little bits and pieces. You can recognize pieces as once part of a leaf, but the type of leaf can no longer be identified. You will probably see white strands of fungus living on the energy still contained in the bits of plant parts, and you will see little “roly-poly” bugs and worms and ants and snails; and you should know that there are many, many organisms 134 in this layer too tiny to see with the naked eye. It is in this decomposing layer, so often overlooked, where the majority of the species in a forest live. The forest’s real biodiversity lies here, but because these organisms are so small and “unsexy ,” they are less studied and thus are not as well understood as the larger organisms like the trees, the birds, and the mammals. But a true naturalist will eventually try to learn about them. Rilke says in his poem from A Book for the Hours of Prayer: I live my life in growing orbits which move out over the things of the world. Perhaps I can never achieve the last, but that will be my attempt. I am circling around God, around the ancient tower, and I have been circling for a thousand years, and I still don’t know if I am a falcon, or a storm, or a great song.2 Or, he might have added, a snail. Among the many forest organisms that need further study are the little land snails. There may be dozens of species of them in a single location, some smaller than a freckle and others larger than a quarter, but all with the characteristic whorled shell we associate with snails. The slugs and snails you find in gardens near houses are usually species that have been introduced from other continents; here in North America, removed from their native predators...