The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring by Richard Preston Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring
Book Review: Trees Are Not A Boring Subject
Summary: 5 Stars
After watching the Discovery Channel series, Planet Earth (probably the best television I have seen to date), I was inspired to read something concerning our natural world. Enter The Wild Trees: A Story of Passion and Daring by Richard Preston.
Contents:
1: Vertical Eden
2: The Fall of Telperion
3: The Opening of the Labyrinth
4: Love in Zeus
5: Into the Deep Canopy
This is the story of some very special, passionate, dedicated, crazy scientists (and those in their circle). They are botanists, but of a very specific variety; these people study giant trees: redwoods, sequoias, and mountain ash. In the case of the redwood, they study trees over 350 feet tall (106.68 meters). Giants. Trees that were growing in California and Oregon before Christ.
The story centers on one specific scientist, Steve Sillett. Bouncing around, with no real plan, he finds himself in a redwood forest. Impulsively, he decides to free climb the giant tree. As he moves up the tree (with no ropes, safety gear, or spotter) he discovers an ecosystem that very few, if any, people have ever seen, let alone studied. It is a life altering moment. He heads to college with a purpose, he will be a botanist, studying these giants of the forest. Along the way, he meets Michael Taylor, a bagger at a small grocery. Michael feels the need to find the tallest tree. In fact, in his free time, Michael is bushwhacking through the redwood forests, cataloging his discoveries. Together, Michael and Steve make a formidable team. Add to this team other botanists and tree climbers and you have an amazing group of people dedicated to researching the canopy of the giant trees. And not just redwoods. Steve, and members of his group, travel to Australia to study the mountain ash, the giant of the southern hemisphere, but "small" compared to the redwood. To actually live the story, Richard Preston takes up tree climbing (trained professionally) and takes to the air with Sillett and Company. The book leads up to the discovery of the tallest tree on the planet, a 379.1 foot (115.5m) tall redwood named Hyperion (all of the trees, once discovered, are named by the person that made the discovery - in this case Michael Taylor, who realized a life long dream of finding the tallest tree).
Trees, you say? Boring, you say? I tell you that you have to read this book. It is probably the best book I have read this year. All of the people in this book have baggage. They are complex people, that understand the forest, the big trees. Even Michael Taylor, who shows Sillett the biggest of the big trees, has a fear of heights. He never goes up into one of his discoveries. Steve ruins a marriage because of his drive to study the redwoods. Maria Antoine, a botanist that studies lichens in the tall trees, has problems with her family. And there are more examples. And the trees? I am fascinated by redwoods. To think that these trees, living in inaccessible parts of California and Oregon (did you know that those areas are actually rainforests?) were living and growing around the time of the Roman Empire is amazing. That's right, these trees are thousands of years old. Time to them is nothing. To learn about a very unique ecosystem living in the canopies of these trees is incredible. Salamanders, lichens, other trees, never knowing that there is a forest floor. Hundreds of feet in the air. Unbelievable. I wasn't too happy with Preston going climbing in the trees, nor with Sillett taking him up when a weather front was coming. That didn't strike me as "safe." But on the other hand, a first person account of an actual climb proved that what these scientists accomplish is nothing short of unimaginable. Finally, the illustrations in this book are works of art. Preston did a great thing by having Andrew Joslin create them. I don't know how Joslin did them, but you are treated to wonderful illustrations; they add immensely to the story.
I have visited the Muir Woods National Monument. While those trees are big, they are small as compared to the ones described in the book. I remember seeing the trees, but I don't think that I appreciated them. After reading this book, I want to see those trees again.
An excellent book on the tallest living things on the face of the planet.
Book Review: An Unexpected Pleasure
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm not quite sure what to call The Wild Trees. It is part a history of the exploration of the canopies of tall trees, especially the redwoods on the Pacific Coast. It is part a manual on both tree climbing and the ecology of tree canopies. It is part a biography of Steve Sillett and his collection of counter-cultural friends. It is part an autobiography of Richard Preston's love affair with the tall trees. Whatever it is, this quirky book is a joy to read. After reading it, you will never look at trees in quite the same way again. Book Review: Cavorting in the canopy
Summary: 5 Stars
They're almost impossible to see properly. If you're near the base in a neck-cricking stance, the tops are lost in a maze of foliage. At at distance, its cousins and offspring surround the one you want to consider. One redwood in a grove becomes lost to view, while an individual obscures itself. They're impossible to climb, the first branches may not start for nearly twenty stories in the air - not your backyard beech or maple tree. The bark is difficult to grasp, and is held in place tenuously. It's little wonder that studying the canopy of the Coast Redwood defied not only attempts, but stifled interest until very recently. In this excellent account, Preston writes of the first Redwood explorers. They are worthy of his skill as a writer, and his subjects fit to stand with Columbus or Cook. Better, Aldo Leopold.
The pivotal character is one Steve Sillett, who followed an impulse to see what those canopies might reveal. He eschewed technology - no helicopter lift nor real climbing equipment in the beginning, Sillett "free-climbed" a "Sequoia sempervirens" just to see if he could do it. The event prompted a life-long love affair with these aged giants of the California mountains. His unending drive to learn more about how the trees grow and propagate, what other plants or creatures might occupy it and perhaps to discover mammoth trees surviving loggers' depredations, might lead some to brand him a "kook". Some already have. But Sillett's aboreal ventures are serious, particularly now as the climate on which these giants survive is seriously threatened.
Nobody, even somebody so dedicated as Sillett, climbs a redwood alone. Preston very deftly brings into our view those working with Sillett and with others. Michael Taylor, whose multi-faceted career deserves a book of its own, is introduced and followed through the twists and turns of his fascinating life. Marie Antoine, who was raised on an island in northwestern Ontario, ultimately becomes Sillett's wife. Their courtship at the top of a giant redwood is almost embarrassing reading, but their shared passions are more than merely physical. When her hips are strapped into a climbing harness, how does a woman relieve herself? At the top of a redwood you are clearly aware of the "redline" - the distance above which a fall is inevitably fatal. One of their group dropped fifty metres - yet fortuitously survived to climb again. Even so, Sillett and Antoine celebrated their marriage ceremony in the canopy - and the officiating minister was elevated with them. And he didn't have to shout.
The other quest, to find the tallest Redwood, is almost a separate story. Loggers have demolished much of the Redwood forest, but there are hidden enclaves where monster trees remain untouched - and unseen. Measuring their height is a two-step process, Preston explains. An estimate, immensely difficult to obtain and often done with crude equipment from hundreds of metres distance, must be verified. The only reliable verification is to - yes, climb the tree and drop a measuring tape. The quest seems endless, if only because access to the trees means exhausting forays through mazes of fallen giants. Their collapse is partly due to the strange root system. Unlike most trees, the Redwood has no taproot for resistance against winds. Since many factors, age among them, leads to giant trees with hollow cores, wind-toppled Redwoods are not uncommon. Over the lengthy life of a Redwood grove, many are felled. A particularly tragic case of this occurs when one of the measured giants, "Telperion", is toppled the year after its discovery. Preston provides general locations of some of the highest specimens, each given a name to certify its standing among the others. Such appellations as "Atlas", "Pig Snout", "Terex Titan" and "Hyperion" [the tallest yet measured] are now applied to trees - whose location remains a closely-guarded secret.
From California, Preston accompanies Sillett to Australia where "Eucalyptus regnans" competes with the Coast Redwood for aerial acclaim. Scaling them is no easier, as there are droves of land leeches to intercept the climbers even before they start aloft. They persevere to find a fresh wonderland in the Southern canopy. Preston, by this time, had undertaken climbing training and was fully prepared to meeting the challenges of climbing arboreal monsters. He is as infected by the tree-climbing virus as his subjects, relating his own and their feats with enthusiasm born of familiarity. Well illustrated with graphics by Andrew Joslin, this book is a landmark effort in describing a new breed of explorers and the wonders they revealed to us. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
Book Review: Outstanding!
Summary: 5 Stars
I am an avid reader of adventure books, and this ranks very high on my list. I was so engrossed in the story, it simply pained me to put this book it down. Preston beautifully weaves together many themes in this book - the adventure of climbing trees, the almost spiritual beauty of ancient Redwoods, the sciences of botany and ecology, a bit of romance, and most of all, people following their passions in spite of obstacles and fulfilling their dreams.
My interest in the book was originally inspired by a trip to Redwood National Park, and the book has now inspired me to pursue recreational tree climbing as a hobby. Don't be surprised if you are similarly inspired.
A great read - highly recommended.
Book Review: Oldest living things on earth.?
Summary: 5 Stars
If you have ever wanted to see or have seen the California redwoods, you will enjoy this book. Richard Preston got so interested in the trees that he learned to climb them--a feat equal to mountain climbing and just as dangerous, so he could experience them first hand. These ancient plants, thought to be between 2,000 and 3,000 years old, are a world apart from any other plants living today. Because they are so unusual, individual trees have been named, climbed, measured, and thoroughly explored from the ground to the tip. The exact location of the tallest specimens is a well kept secret by the botanists who have studied them. Richard Preston's book, which reads like an adventure novel, is a very good read about a most unusual subject.