From the New York Times–bestselling author of The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs (295,000 copies in print), an eye-opening adventure into the secret language of trees, showing a whole secret world of clues and signs hidden in branches, bark, roots, leaves, buds, trunks, canopies, and more
New York Times–bestselling author Tristan Gooley opens our eyes to the secret language of trees—and the natural wonders they reveal all around us
 
Trees are keen to tell us so much. They’ll tell us about the land, the water, the people, the animals, the weather, and time. And they will tell us about their lives, the good bits and bad. Trees tell a story, but only to those who know how to read it.

In How to Read a Tree, Gooley uncovers the clues hiding in plain sight: in a tree’s branches and leaves; its bark, buds, and flowers; even its stump. Leaves with a pale, central streak mean that water is nearby. Young, low-growing branches show that a tree is struggling. And reddish or purple bark signals new growth.

Like snowflakes, no two trees are exactly the same. Every difference reveals the epic story this tree has lived—if we stop to look closely.
 
Contributor Bio(s)
 
TRISTAN GOOLEY is the New York Times–bestselling author of How to Read Water, How to Read Nature, The Natural Navigator, The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs, The Secret World of Weather, and The Nature Instinct. He has led expeditions on five continents, climbed mountains in three, and is the only living person to have both flown and sailed solo across the Atlantic. His more than two decades of pioneering outdoor experience include research among tribal peoples in some of the remotest regions on Earth.