Photos & text by Anne Groebner

There is an ancient Douglas fir that guards the entrance to the Land of the Giants trail. Its bristled needles are bunched tightly in thick skirts that encircle its ragged, corky bark. It leans slightly and is shaped by gusty winds that hurl across an open meadow. There’s no telling how old it is — but it stands sturdy. This elder fir has defied nature and humans, staying rooted within the cindered, sandy, and basalt-filled earth left behind by volcanic lava flows. It is the greeter to hikers and bikers — I am certain this tree has been around for a very long time.

Douglas firs are unique. They are conifers, which means they produce seeds in cones instead of flowers. The cones are oblong, two to four inches long with three-pointed bracts that hang like pendants, primarily in the upper crown. They’re not really a fir, nor are they a pine, they are their own genus (Pseudotsuga). However, they are an “evergreen” which means that they keep their needle-like leaves all year long. 

Through the past few years, I have been drawn to this tree. The Land of the Giants Trail was introduced to me years ago by Tom Jernigan, author of the book Silent Witness. In his book, he talks about an ancient Douglas fir (located in a different area within the same volcanic field) that bears witness to the history that unfolds underneath its branches. From the Native Americans that lived in the area to the Spanish Conquistadors and beyond. The tree he writes about is much larger and wider (it took 16 hikers finger-tip-to-finger-tip to surround the trunk) than the one that guards this trail, yet I sense the tree I am writing about here could be what ecologist Suzanne Simard calls the “mother” tree.

“Trees are ‘social creatures’ that communicate with each other in cooperative ways,” Suzanne Simard explains. Simard is a professor of forest ecology at the University of British Columbia. In her interview with NPR* she talks about tree networks through mycorrhizal fungus — the type of fungus that grows through the soil and picks up nutrients and water and brings it to seedlings. This fungi creates an underground network that resembles neural networks in our brains. 

Most plants have binding relationships with fungi. Their relationship is necessary for their growth and fitness and to carry their genes to the next generations. On the flip side, fungi need this relationship with plants and trees because they don’t have leaves for photosynthesis. So they enter into symbiosis, living together in the root and exchanging essential nutrients. 

Simard states, “the trees in a forest are often linked to each other via an older tree,” she calls a “mother” or “hub” tree. The “mother tree” can help facilitate the growth of the understory seedlings. She says, “The seedlings will link into the network of the old trees and benefit from the huge uptake resource capacity. And the old trees will also pass a little bit of carbon, and nutrients, and water to the little seedlings, at crucial times in their lives, that actually help them survive.” In fact, Simard discovered that when an old tree is dying, it will send out even more nutrients and other signals to its kin — making it crucial to leave dying trees in the forest.

In one of Simard’s studies, she watched as a Douglas fir, that had been injured by insects, appeared to send chemical warning signals to a ponderosa pine growing nearby. The pine tree then produced defense enzymes to protect against the insect. They were sharing information that was beneficial to the entire forest — pretty amazing.

Under normal circumstances, Douglas firs only live to be, at the most, 400 years. However, there is one they named “Yoda” that lived over 650 years in El Malpais National Monument near Grants, New Mexico. A core sample taken in 1991, estimated that Yoda had lived since 1406, but according to some dendrochronologists (who use of tree-ring analysis), it’s more likely that it had lived since 1350. During the more than six centuries of its life, it has survived many droughts, including the mega-drought that took place in the 16th century. Recent changes in climate, however, have increased the temperatures and with the recent southwest drought, Yoda did not survive. 

Through time, Douglas firs have been great resources to many cultures, including one of the first Christmas trees. They symbolize determination, honesty, and the endurance that comes with hope for the future. The ancient Celts used the fir tree as a symbol of bravery. Fir cones also have their own symbolism. They open to the sun when it is out and shining, and close up protectively in the snow or rain. This gives them the meaning of wisdom and discernment.

 

If you happen upon the old Douglas fir, standing guard to the Land of the Giants Trail, take a moment to stand next to this ancient tree and gaze up through its gnarly branches and imagine what history this tree, too, has witnessed. Imagine the difficulties it faced throughout, not only centuries but maybe a millennium. Imagine the near-mortal mishaps that might have taken its life over and over again. And yet, it is still standing. The surrounding aspen, ponderosa, and many other plants and trees are all networked to this “matriarchal” tree. They are having a conversation. They are discussing their survival —and if you listen closely, you may hear her whisper “never, ever lose hope.”