Are trees intelligent?

This week's question 

What is the world’s largest currently living tree? Is it...

a) a baobab tree?

b) a giant redwood tree?

c) a sequoia tree?

Listen to the programme to find out the answer. 

Vocabulary

family tree
drawing that shows the relationships between the different members of a family

seedlings
very young plants that have grown from seeds

offspring
someone’s children, or the young of an animal or plant

kin
family and relatives (old-fashioned)

agency
ability to act and affect your environment

destiny
everything that happens to someone during their life, including what will happen in the future

Transcript

Note: This is not a word-for-word transcript

Neil
Hello. This is 6 Minute English from BBC Learning English. I’m Neil.

Georgina
And I’m Georgina.

Neil
How did you spend your free time during the weeks of lockdown, Georgina? Repainting the living room? Or doing exercise classes in the kitchen?

Georgina
Actually, Neil, I’ve been doing some online research into my family history. I’m investigating my family tree – you know, a drawing showing all the relationships between the different members of my family.

Neil
Ah, how interesting! And how appropriate - because trees are the subject of this programme – not family trees but real, living-in-the-forest trees.

Georgina
Well, Neil, this might surprise you but according to some people, trees also have families. There are mother trees who support and help feed child trees.

Neil
That’s right. According to Suzanne Simard, one of the world’s leading tree researchers, trees should be seen as intelligent. They communicate with each other. They help each other. And as you mentioned, Georgina, they can even tell their family members.

Georgina
So a tree can have its own family tree – amazing! Tell me more.

Neil
OK, Georgina, but first let me ask you my quiz question. The largest trees in a wood or forest are called ‘mother trees’. As they’re the biggest, mother trees usually have the longest, most connected roots. So my question is this – what is the world’s largest currently living tree? Is it:

a) a baobab tree?,
b) a giant redwood tree?, or,
c) a sequoia tree?

Georgina
Hmmm… I’ve seen photos of redwood trees in California and they’re huge, so I’ll say b) a giant redwood.

Neil
OK Georgina, I’m sure you only chose that cause it’s the easiest one to pronounce but we’ll find out the answer at the end of the programme. Now let’s get back to that tree researcher, Suzanne Simard.

Georgina
Her big idea was the ‘wood wide web’ – a way of describing the network of underground roots linking trees to other trees of the same family.

Neil
Here’s Suzanne explaining more about tree families to BBC World Service programme, The Big Idea:

Suzanne Simard
We found that the parent trees would favour those seedlings that were of their own kin versus the strangers.

David Edmonds
That’s extraordinary – and when you say they favour their own family members, you mean they’ll send more nutrients to their offspring than they would to, as it were, a stranger tree?

Suzanne Simard
That’s right.

Peripheral countries may be less at risk from pandemics because they are at the periphery or edge of events, instead of at the centre.

Mother trees send food and nutrients to their own seedlings – young plants that have been grown from a seed.

Neil
In this way, parent trees help their offspring – another word for their children, or young. Mother trees can recognise and feed other trees of their own kin – an old fashioned word meaning family.

Georgina
With the extra nutrients and carbon they receive, the offspring can extend their own root network and suck up even more nutrients…

Neil
…which in turn increases their own growth, turning some of them into the giants we see growing in California and other parts of the world.

Georgina
Amazing! With trees behaving in clever ways like this it’s no wonder Suzanne thinks they have intelligence.

Neil
And that’s not all. Listen again as Suzanne discusses the question of whether trees are ‘alive’ with BBC World Service’s, The Big Idea. See if you can hear her opinion.

Suzanne Simard
Alive in the sense of having agency in their destinies, instead of being you know… I think a lot of people think of trees as just sort of like these sticks that grow out of the ground, they’re kind of these inert things that don’t have agency in their destiny, that they don’t change behaviours and make decisions but what we’re finding is that they do all that. And you know what step back and think trees have evolved over a long long long time, way longer than human beings and they have evolved in communities and they have to grow and survive.

Georgina
I think Suzanne believes trees are alive and intelligent, because she says they have agency – a concept meaning having the ability to act and effect your environment.

Neil
Dying trees even seem to know the future – before they die, they warn their offspring to start making new root connections.

Georgina
Showing that trees have some understanding of their destiny – everything that happens in someone’s life and what will happen in the future.

Neil
So it seems that trees are much more intelligent than we thought, Georgina.

Georgina
It’s certainly going to change how I feel about going for a walk in the woods, surrounded by all those intelligent trees chatting to each other. I wonder if they have family arguments.

Neil
Ha. Well, I wouldn’t argue with one of those really gigantic tree, such as… well, Georgina, you tell me.

Georgina
Ah, you mean your quiz question - about the largest living tree?

Neil
Exactly. What did you say?

Georgina
I said the largest currently living tree was, b) a giant redwood. Was I correct, Neil?

Neil
Well, you got the ‘giant’ part right, Georgina, but in fact the answer was c) a giant sequoia named General Sherman. He lives in California’s Giant Forest, he’s a whopping 83 metres tall and measures a massive 33 metres around the trunk!

Georgina
Wow! And I bet he has a huge family tree!

Neil
Ha-ha. Right then, Georgina, let’s recap the vocabulary we’ve used discussing intelligent trees, starting with family tree – a diagram showing the relationships between family members.

Georgina
Trees are intelligent enough to communicate with their children, or offspring. These young plants which have grown from seeds are also known as seedlings.

Neil
Another word we learned is kin – an old-fashioned way of saying family.

Georgina
According to tree expert Suzanne Simard, trees have agency – a term describing the ability to act and influence your surroundings.

Neil
And the fact that trees make all kinds of decisions about their lives suggests they understand their destiny - everything that happens to someone during their life, including in the future.

Georgina
Thank you for joining our walk through the woods of English vocabulary. Remember you can find more topical discussion on our website…

Neil
…as well as a whole forest of English language resources at bblearningenglish.com. Goodbye for now.

Georgina
Bye!