Every day, trees in the forest compete with one another for the light needed to make their food. What can they teach us about surviving in a competitive world?
Find a mentor. Longer-living evergreens are often given an advantage in their younger years by shorter-lived deciduous nurse trees. In my yard, birches frequently shelter small spruce and firs from winds, snows and grazing mammals.
Make the most of the storms of life. When Hurricane Juan blew down mature trees in 2003, the forest suddenly was opened to a light it hadn’t seen in decades. Balsam firs and mountain ash took advantage of the increased light, experiencing exponential growth.
Know your competition and be ready to act. Scientists at the University of Buenos Aires recently discovered that plants are able to anticipate future competition from other plants in their environment by discerning a variance in the color of light that’s reflected off neighboring plants. If potential competition is sensed, they react by shooting up towards the light more quickly than normal.
Agility means that you are faster than your competition. Agile time frames are measured in weeks and months, not years.
~ Michael Hugos
Often, trees in the open will grow at a slower rate than those growing competitively in stands. If shallow-rooted, the former are also more likely to be toppled over during a windstorm.
I’m in competition with myself and I’m losing.
~ Roger Waters
And while the law of competition may be sometimes hard for the individual, it is best for the race, because it ensures the survival of the fittest in every department.
~ Andrew Carnegie
Winners will go on to litter the forest floor with the next generation of trees for years to come.
This post is in response to Assignment 15: Competition over at Scott’s Views Infinitum.
I like all this pep talk in regard to trees but it doesn’t always pan out in the real world.
OOps, the real world of PEOPLE who don’t live in quite the same forest as the trees.
47whitebuffalo, so few trees make it to the end of the competition that it doesn’t really work for the majority of them either. A great many die of light starvation before they have a chance to mature. But I love the way they all make such a grand effort of growing where they’re planted.
Love your take on the assignment! Very educational, too.
Thanks for your comment on my blog 🙂
thedaily click, thanks for stopping by the woods for a visit 🙂
I was wondering if someone would look at the natural world for this assignment. I have studied lots of different “competitions” in nature. How plants, and in this case, trees compete for sunlight is amazing to find out about.
Your photos and commentary bring to light (pun intended) the adaptations used to ensure the capture of energy from the Sun. Very interesting how plants have the ability to predict location of competition and do something to prevent it.
Your photo essays are always well composed and this one is no different. Well done!
Scott, it is VERY amazing. New research would suggest that plants seem to sense a lot more than previously thought.
Thanks for providing yet another opportunity to learn about a new aspect of photography.
I will walk through the woods next time with a new perspective.
Grace, as if walking through the woods wasn’t wonderful enough already 🙂
What a unique look at competition! Great idea – and educational too! I had no idea that plants could prepare for potential competition.
Karma, it was a new discovery for me too. I wonder if houseplants are similarly sensitive or if direct sunlight is necessary for them to pick up the colors needed to determine potential competition. What we don’t know about plants is still a lot.
Trees are very wise. Thank you for sharing all the secrets that they know…
Kathy, they are indeed. Can you imagine all the forest secrets we’d learn if either of us ever gets around to sitting under the elderberry tree at midnight on Midsummer’s Eve?
A+ Interesting take on an interesting assignment Amy-Lynn
Thank you Sybil 🙂
Wonderful post – I’m not surprised that trees can do all these things. Wonderful beings that they are!
Dawn, I’m not surprised either 🙂
Yeh, maybe it takes a forest to raise a tree???
Nice story and metaphor!
Catharus, exactly! What a great way to put it.
A very creative response to your assignment – I like the story your forest trees told.
Thanks Reggie. Trees are excellent storytellers. They must have some Irish in their roots 😉
[…] is fierce just to stay alive. If you are a tree, light is your main source of energy and Amy-Lynn shows and tells us how trees have adapted to make sure they win in their game of […]
That’s so amazing that trees are able to anticipate future competition from other plants! I agree with Kathy, trees are very wise and I suspect they still have much more to teach us!
Barbara, it is indeed amazing. Who would have thought plants could be so perceptive?
Excellent post, Amy-Lynn! I think it’s also important that you brought up the idea that storms bring light to the forest floor, all part of nature’s way of renewing. So often we view the aftermath of downed forests solely as destruction, but as your post so wonderfully points out, there is light to be had at the end of the storm.
Julian, I love the way you put it: that there is light to be had at the end of the storm! Nature’s clouds are lined with silver.
That discovery about competition among plants and how they are sensitive to it is truly enlightening. Nature is full of surprises ..there is always something to understand. I enjoyed this photo report 🙂