Mother Aspen: A Story of How Forests Cooperate and Communicate

A lyrical story of an aspen grove through the seasons, inspired by the ground-breaking work of Dr. Suzanne Simard on how trees and fungi talk to each other.

In early spring, the Mother Tree wakens. She is hundreds of years old, and her children are the sprouts that she sends up from her roots. They look like many separate trees, but they are all part of the Mother Tree.

Above ground, the aspens use the sun to produce sugar. Below ground, fungi wrap threads around the aspen’s roots, feeding on the sugar that they cannot make themselves. And in exchange, the fungi carry messages from tree to tree — warnings of drought, disease and infestations.

Through the seasons and years, the Mother Tree shelters and feeds the other trees, the animals that make their home in the grove and the fungi that make it possible for the trees to talk to each other. But when a violent storm upends the order of things, can the forest survive without its Mother Tree?

This story of symbiosis, richly illustrated by Crystal Smith, shows how the forest inhabitants thrive by working together. An author’s note explains the significance of mycorrhizal networks and why it is crucial to protect aspen forests.