Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the Wisdom of the Forest

Simard hikes with her mother near the alpine Stein Valley. They reflect on the lichens and moss growing on the trees around them, with Simard’s mother remarking that “It just takes one plant to get going, then the others come along” (81). Simard is heartened by her mother’s steady, straightforward personality and the quiet patience of the forest.

Jean and Simard share an apartment in Kamloops. Jean suggests contacting Alan Vyse at the Forest Service for a silviculturist research position. Simard lands an interview with him; they discuss her experience with the clear-cuts of the logging company and her career goals. Alan hires her as a researcher the following February to monitor weeding effects in specific clear-cuts. Though it is not exactly what Simard wants to be researching, she is grateful for the experience. She hires her sister, Robyn, to work as her assistant.

When Simard and Robyn reach the Blue River clear-cuts, Simard worries about the ethics of the experiment: “I was in charge of an experiment that required me to kill plants, creating yet another type of displacement” (85). Under Alan’s guidance, Simard conducts an experiment that uses different amounts of the herbicide Roundup in places throughout the clear-cut to test the efficiency of the government’s “free-to-grow” policy, which eradicates all other plants around a pine seedling. Wearing protective equipment, Simard and Robyn spray the Roundup and wait a month to measure growth rates. The highest dose of Roundup results in the most non-competitive free-to-grow space.

Simard is contracted to design another weeding experiment for free-to-grow policies, which she considers to be an “all-out war on native plants and broadleaf trees” (91). She is soon offered a permanent position at the Forest Service with Alan as her supervisor. She receives a grant to study the relationship between birch trees, conifers, and mycorrhizal fungi; she hopes to prove that birch trees contribute to the conifers’ growth and should be considered more than weeds. Simard has to replant over the course of five years, until the fifth iteration of the experiment includes a transfer of soil rich in fungi. The transplanted soil significantly contributes to plant growth. Simard must accept the responsibility of standing up to the policymakers, sharing her research, and hopefully stopping the incessant spraying of pesticides and herbicides that are killing the forest. Simard enrolls in graduate school at Oregon State University.

Simard begins an experiment for her master’s degree to test whether alder is truly the “pine killer” policymakers have labeled it. With Robyn’s help, she conducts the experiment in an old clear-cut full of Sitka alders. Simard hopes to discover that the alders cooperate instead of compete with pines. A group of prisoners is briefly assigned to help set up the experiment, but the guards must transport them back to the prison when a fight breaks out. Simard enlists the rest of her family as research assistants. She also enlists Don, a research assistant that Simard met at Oregon State and with whom she has just begun a relationship. Over the course of several weeks, Simard and her family monitor the resources and soil in the clear-cut. One task uses a radioactive neutron probe to test for water in the soil, and Simard and Robyn are briefly exposed to radioactivity. Preliminary results from the experiment suggest that alders do take most of the water from the soil; next, Simard must compare water resources in middle and late August. In doing so, she discovers that the alder is actually helping to reroute groundwater and remove water stress on the pines, as well as providing the pines with necessary nitrogen.

Simard returns to Oregon State and moves in with Don. They each pursue graduate work, with Simard needing to convince policymakers of the benefits of alder for pine growth. Her main issue is securing enough evidence; the seedlings she has planted will need decades to grow to full maturity. Through further research, she begins to hypothesize that mycorrhizal fungi are responsible for the nitrogen transfer between alder and pine. Don advises her to prepare for public speaking and conferences if she wants to convince policymakers away from their capitalistic practices. Simard completes her master’s degree. She and Don move to Canada and get married when she is 29 years old.

Four years later, Simard is a doctoral student attending a conference to present her research on alder and pine cooperation. She is frightened of public speaking and is speaking to an audience that mostly supports the use of Roundup and other toxic herbicides. As Simard presents her research, she notes the policymakers in the audience looking increasingly annoyed with her. Simard continues despite several men leaving the audience and others talking through her speech. She proposes a long-term view of forest conservation rather than the “short-term growth gains” that profit the policymakers most (133). She notes that the foresters in the audience seem grateful to hear that her results “matched some of what they were seeing in the bush” (135). After the conference, Simard and Jean meet up with Kelly at a local bar.

Simard is upset about the reception of her research and feels particularly insecure about her status as a woman in the scientific research community. Both she and Kelly drink heavily. They toast to Kelly’s wife’s newly announced pregnancy. When Kelly makes an offhand, misogynistic comment, Simard is deeply hurt. The two argue loudly, with Simard defending a woman’s right to be more than a housewife and mother, as Kelly advocates. Simard leaves the bar furious with her brother.