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Title details for Twelve Trees by Daniel Lewis - Wait list

Twelve Trees

The Deep Roots of Our Future

by Daniel Lewis
Kaleo Griffith
Audiobook
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Wait time: About 6 weeks
A compelling global exploration of nature and survival as seen via a dozen species of trees, offering "extensive insight into the ways in which humans and trees are interconnected" (BookPage), revealing the challenges facing our planet and how scientists are working urgently to save our forests and our future.
The world today is undergoing the most rapid environmental transformation in human history—from climate change to deforestation. Scientists, ethnobotanists, indigenous peoples, and collectives of all kinds are closely studying trees and their biology to understand how and why trees function individually and collectively in the ways they do. In Twelve Trees, Daniel Lewis, curator and historian at one of the world's most renowned research libraries, travels the world to learn about these trees in their habitats.

Lewis takes us on a sweeping journey to plant breeding labs, botanical gardens, research facilities, deep inside museum collections, to the tops of tall trees, underwater, and around the Earth, journeying into the deserts of the American west and the deep jungles of Peru, to offer a globe-spanning perspective on the crucial impact trees have on our entire planet. When a once-common tree goes extinct in the wild but survives in a botanical garden, what happens next? How can scientists reconstruct lost genomes and habitats? How does a tree store thousands of gallons of water, or offer up perfectly preserved insects from millions of years ago, or root itself in muddy swamps and remain standing? How does a 5,000-year-old tree manage to live, and what can we learn from it? And how can science account for the survival of one species at the expense of others? Twelve Trees "brims with wonder, appreciation, and even some small hope" (Booklist) and is an awe-inspiring story of our world, its past, and its future.

Note—species include: * The Lost Tree of Easter Island (Sophora toromiro) * The coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) * Hymenaea protera [a fossil tree] * The Longleaf pine (Pinus palustris) * East Indian sandalwood (Santanum album) * The Bristlecone pine (Pinus longaeva) * West African ebony (Diospyros crassiflora) * The Tasmanian blue gum eucalyptus (Eucalyptus globulus) * Olive tree (Olea europaea) * Baobab (Adansonia digitata) * the kapok tree (Ceiba pentandra) * The bald cypress (Taxodium distichum)

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    March 12, 2024

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781797172835
      • File size: 273530 KB
      • Duration: 09:29:51

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      January 22, 2024
      “Every species of tree offers lessons to the world,” according to this enchanting study. Lewis (Belonging on an Island)—a curator at the Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens in Southern California—expounds on the biology and ecology of African baobabs, Great Basin bristlecone pines, and Central African forest ebony, among other tree species. Explaining the extraordinary abilities of California’s coast redwoods, Lewis notes that the trees “generate some two million pounds of negative pressure” to pull water from their roots to their uppermost branches, a journey that takes weeks to complete. Lewis also explores trees’ relationships with humans, discussing how the Indian government has implemented strict bureaucratic rules controlling the growth and sale of East Indian sandalwood trees, which are often poached and sold for huge sums because of their importance to traditional Asian medicine (“When a farmer has approval to harvest, a government official must come in person to uproot the entire tree”). The plentiful trivia fascinates, and Lewis has a talent for complicating conventional wisdom. For instance, he contends that despite California residents’ denigration of the invasive blue gum eucalyptus as the “nation’s largest weed,” it provides crucial shelter for migrating monarch butterflies, whose needs aren’t met by native vegetation. The result is a loving paean to all things arboreal. Agent: Wendy Strothman, Strothman Agency.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Books come from trees, but the trees themselves can tell us stories of their own if we know how to listen. Fittingly, I listened to part of this audiobook while sitting next to a campfire. Kaleo Griffith's narration is almost perfect for such a fireside chat. His straightforward yet conversational tone exactly matches the feel of the work. Author Daniel Lewis profiles a dozen trees, traveling the globe from Easter Island to the American West, from the Caribbean to Africa, offering up lessons in climate change, habitat preservation, and species survival. Visits to outdoor locales and indoor labs sound like inviting travelogs. Lewis is a science writer, not a scientist. So the book is written for lay listeners and adapts well to audio. R.C.G. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine
    • Library Journal

      June 1, 2024

      Lewis (senior curator, History of Science and Technology, Huntington Lib., Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens; Belonging on an Island) sets out to understand how 12 different species of trees live individually and as communities and how human activities affect their abundance, genetic adaptations, and their (and human's) very survival. Lewis notes that the approximately three billion trees on Earth are an essential element in maintaining the planet's environmental balance. Of these, he focuses on trees as far-ranging as the Easter Island Sophora toromiro, coastal redwoods, Tasmanian blue gum eucalyptus, Indian sandalwoods, and the West African ebony. Enhanced by narrator Kaleo Griffith's pleasant, well-paced presentation, this narrative engagingly relates Lewis's exploration of trees in their natural habitats and visits to museums, botanical gardens, and research facilities. He outlines the delicate and often thorny social, political, legal, and environmental pressures that come to bear on the trees and invitingly provides captivating facts about how humans, other animals, birds, insects, and microbes use trees. VERDICT Lewis's research makes clear the value and vulnerability of trees and other species. A must-listen for anyone interested in the natural world, particularly in trees and their effect on the greater environment.--Joanna M. Burkhardt

      Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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