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posted by martyb on Sunday July 28 2019, @12:47AM   Printer-friendly
from the WorldWarTree dept.

Deep in the North Island Forests of New Zealand, a zombie tree lays dreaming.

Ecologists [and co-equal authors] Sebastian Leuzinger and Martin Bader spotted [an] apparently dead kauri pine tree stump (Agathis australis) [...], but it showed something that dead trees don't have: sap running through it.

Testing of water flows in the stump and its neighbors reveals that the kauri pine tree's neighbors are keeping the foliage free stump alive. But why?

Leuzinger and his colleagues think the tree stump's roots have been grafted together with roots from other trees, something that is known to happen when trees sense they can share resources with the trees around them. These grafts allow trees to form a type of 'superorganism' in a forest, and help groups of trees improve their collective stability.

In this case however

It's not clear yet what the surrounding trees get out of a deal like this. The researchers say one possible[sic] is that the connections were formed when the stump was still a healthy tree, and it's simply not letting go.

Maybe the surrounding trees get to extend their own root networks, and gather more water and nutrients, by keeping the connection to the stump.

The ecologists note that "More research is going to be needed to find out for sure."

Not touched on is what we are all thinking - that the dead tree is in control, slowly and inexorably spreading as the other trees scream in terrified tree speak, a leaf rustle here, a scrape of bark there, crying out for our help in their desperation...but we cannot hear them.

Journal Reference
"Hydraulic Coupling of a Leafless Kauri Tree Remnant to Conspecific Hosts" M.K-F. Bader, S. Leuzinger. iScience, July 25,2019 DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2019.05.009


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  • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday July 28 2019, @04:34PM (1 child)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Sunday July 28 2019, @04:34PM (#872326)

    the kauri pine tree's neighbors are keeping the foliage free stump alive. But why?

    There's a presumption that everything in the world of biology is done for some survival of the fittest advantage. The truth of the matter is: everything in the world of biology is done by chance, survival of the fittest is a secondary effect due to the competition for limited resources - and the competition is slightly less intense on an island like NZ than it is on a continent like Europe, Africa, Asia or the Americas.

    Having said that, sure, if the "zombie" (leafless) stump's roots are providing nutrients and water for the superorganism, then there's no reason whatsoever for the superorganism to cut it off from the photosynthetic products it needs to survive, any more than there is a reason for your body to cut off nutrient supply to your fingers because they lack lungs...

    I have a bamboo colony in my yard which behaves the opposite way, if a stalk is cut such that it has no more leaves, it will either put out more leaves, or more often wither and die - while the superorganism puts its resources into new stalks which have a better chance of getting light on their leaves. Grass and pine trees are quite different.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 29 2019, @12:14AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 29 2019, @12:14AM (#872459)

    You know what will make you think that trees can have evil intent? Have a locust tree. If you leave it alone you will periodically have to cut down some saplings springing up here and there. Cut down the whole thing though, and a forest of saplings appears over night and for ages to come over all of its root footprint. I know it isn't really malicious, but between the thorns and its Medusa response, it feels that way.