CBR16 BINGO: And Also, a repeat of the Earth Day square
BINGO: Détente, And Also, Scandal, Tech, Rings
Wolves in Yellowstone National Park support the beaver population. Salmon help trees grow. Ravens and wolves form an alliance against bears. Peter Wohlleben’s The Secret Network of Nature is filled with fascinating stories about the interconnectivity and delicate balance of our environment.
Wohlleben is a German forestry expert who has written several bestsellers, including The Hidden Life of Trees and The Inner Life of Animals. Given my lukewarm reaction to Hidden Life of Trees, I was happy to find myself more engaged and eager to share interesting tidbits, especially ones that elicited curious “hmms” from me. Example: I learned that some trees release a bitter tasting chemical to discourage roe deer from eating them. No big surprise there; however, studies have shown that the trees don’t release the chemical when their branches are broken, only when deer saliva is present. Trees can detect deer saliva and react accordingly!
The chapter “Salmon in the Trees” was fascinating, as it described how the salmon who don’t make it all the way upstream nourish the ground along riverbanks, providing nitrogen. According to one study, 70 percent of the nitrogen in vegetation growing alongside streams where salmon are present come from the ocean (in other words, from the salmon). Loss of salmon would be devastating for those riparian ecosystems. I was similarly intrigued by the chapter about ants, which describes how ants act as seed distributors for many flowers. The ants are attracted to flower seeds because of the fleshy structure called the eliaosome, which is attached to the outside of the seed. The ants carry the seed back to the nest, eat the fat- and sugar-rich eliaosome, and discard the rest. The ant clean-up crews then carry the “leftovers” away, up to 70 meters away from the ants’ home, thus distributing the flower seeds throughout the area.
Wohlleben is at heart a conservationist. He corrects misconceptions (“Global warming doesn’t mean there will never be cold winters. It just means that cold winters will not happen as often as in the past.”), highlights perils (“The greatest danger for groundwater is not climate change but the extraction of raw materials from the earth, especially through fracking.”), and defends the less charismatic but equally critical components of our environment. He even makes an impassioned defense of the much-maligned bark beetle, describing how human interference has created the situations that allow bark beetles to gain the upper hand on healthy trees (“Instead of blaming the beetles, you could see them as an indication that things are not a they should be.”).
I liked so much about this book; however, a few things gave me pause. In the chapter, “Fairy Tales, Myths, and Species Diversity,” the author disputes the idea that forests need fire to survive. While this may be true for the native species in Wohlleben’s Germany, “Fire bad” is not a blanket statement we can make about all trees. California’s giant sequoias require fire to open their cones and release their seeds. These trees have always relied on low- to moderate-level fires for regeneration, and decades of fire suppression caused long-lasting harm. I would have liked have at least seen a footnote or aside on this subject.
Second, his overriding message, and the sentence he ends the book with, is “We need to leave things alone–on as large a scale as possible.” I agree with that sentiment to the extent that, yes, when humans muck about, we often make things worse than they were to begin with. However, his perspective seems to be that, given enough time, nature can heal itself. The very first chapter in this book is about how beneficial the re-introduction of wolves into Yellowstone has been to that entire ecosystem, something that could not have happened without human intervention. To be fair, Wohlleben states, “I don’t object in principle to making a special effort to help individual species, even if the species is here as a result of human interference.” I just felt like I was getting mixed messages at times. As I mentioned in my review of Hidden Life of Trees, a lot of the author’s information seems to come from his own experiences, which is great–but, anecdotal evidence isn’t the same as scientific research.
This book was conversational in tone, making it accessible for nature lovers who may not be as interested in the hardcore science. Wohlleben has a friendly, folksy tone that’s pleasant and easy to follow but that might turn off some readers. I have to admit the first time he referred to a group of mammals as “Wolf & Co.” I thought it was cute; then came Beeches & Co., etc. etc., and by the fifth time I really wished he’d retire that joke. (This might be an issue with the translation.)
Overall, this is a worthwhile book with some great information. I don’t agree with everything the author poses, but he provides lots of interesting tidbits and food for thought.