I read a book to my youngest recently, I forget the title, at the end of the story there was a series of questions you could ask based on the story. One of them was who are your friends? I was expecting her to reply with the name/s of some of the children she regularly plays with. Her answer? Trees! Like me she has fallen under their spell. As a teenager I had one poster on my bedroom wall not of any of the bands that I loved listening too at the time but a poster of trees. I have often wondered what became of that poster I took it with me when I left home and it travelled around with moe on my many moves, nearly twenty in ten years. I suspect it got left on a wall somewhere......
I love a walk in the woods, any woods will do at any time of year. The colours, sounds and smells are unique to each wood, a walk in the woods is a guaranteed feast to the senses. I have been feasting my senses from an armchair this month, well actually my bed as that is where I do most of my reading, with the wonderful book The Secret Life of Trees by Colin Tudge.
This is a book in three parts, the first deals with the definition of trees, classification, how they may have evolved and the wonder of wood, an amazing natural material. The middle section details all the tree families and gives some examples of each, to go into detail on them all would make for a very big book indeed, and where they grow in the world. This was fascinating as trees belong in so many, varied families many of which contain species that are not trees. I was ready to move onto the final section when this one finished as my head was starting to spin with all the details. The last section was, for me, the most interesting. It details how trees live and survive, where they grow and possible explanations why, their relationship with their local environment including fauna and lastly the future of trees with the warming of the atmosphere. I have loved reading this book, it has been a fascinating insight into the science of trees.
I am undecided what to read next, some fiction A Sudden Light by Garth Stein or more non fiction about Trees, Tree Wisdom by Jacqueline Memory Paterson. I hope I have the time to read both next month.
Linking with A Year in Books
