The Heartbeat of Trees: Embracing Our Ancient Bond with Forests and Nature

As the voice of the woodland trees, German forester Peter Wohlleben shares his attachment to the forest milieu with the reader. Tracing how our senses benefit when surrounded by trees, he encourages breathing the oxygen-enriched air, tasting the individual saps from twigs, feeling the tree trunks’ girding barks, harking to the wind’s tuning of the leaves and the calls of the local denizens, and perhaps distinguishing the chemical messages that plants emit into the surroundings.

Forests provide solitude and serenity, take up carbon dioxide for use in photosynthesis, and store the carbon within their woody mass, with it only being released again as the gas when the body is burned. Along with extolling the wonders of trees, which rhythmically slowly raise and lower their boughs, similar to a heartbeat, in response to the light, while their root system is contrasted with a controlling brain, Wohlleben weighs heavily on the tragedy of the decreasing number of old-growth forests in Europe and the associated loss of the life dependent on those ancient giants. The tragic human destruction of our primeval forests is distressingly described.

This is an interesting book but, whether it is due to translation issues or not, the writing is rather choppy and, unfortunately, several chapters require more cohesive explanations.