The Trees Are Speaking Dispatches from the Salmon Forests

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By: Lynda V Mapes(Author)

272 pages, 40 b/w illustrations

Publisher: University of Washington Press

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ISBN: 9780295753676 Hardback Apr 2025 Not in stock: Usually dispatched within 2-4 weeks
£32.99
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About this book

A call to rethink our relationship with forests.

Ancient and carbon-rich, old-growth forests play an irreplaceable role in the environment. Their complex ecosystems clean the air, purify the water, cool the planet, and teem with life. In a time of climate catastrophe, old-growth and other natural forests face existential threats caused by humans – and their survival is crucial to ours.

In a bicoastal journey, environmental journalist Lynda V. Mapes connects the present and future of Pacific Northwest forests to the hard-logged legacy forests of the northeastern United States. Beginning in Oregon and Washington, where old growth supports, and is supported by, the region's salmon, we meet Jerry Franklin, who led scientists in recognizing and studying the distinctiveness of these majestic spaces. From there, we journey to Vancouver Island, where Indigenous activists and scientists strive to preserve the health of Nuu-chah-nulth traditional homelands amid continued clearcutting. On the East Coast, we see the corduroy patterns of lands that have been logged for generations, leaving industrial carnage along formerly life-filled waterways. Mapes interviews Penobscot elders and scientists whose new practices are restoring the fish runs, as well as loggers using new technologies to harvest more sustainably.

With vibrant storytelling supported by science and traditional ecological knowledge, Mapes invites readers to understand the world where trees are kin, not commodities. The Trees Are Speaking is essential reading for those with a deep interest in environmental stewardship, Indigenous land rights, and the urgent challenges posed by climate change.

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Biography

Lynda V. Mapes covers environmental and Indigenous issues for the Seattle Times. She is the author of six books, including most recently Orca: Shared Waters, Shared Home, winner of the 2021 National Outdoor Book Award and the 2021 Washington State Book Award for nonfiction. Her journalism has earned numerous prestigious awards, including the international 2019 and 2012 Kavli Gold Award for science journalism from the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She is also an associate of the Harvard Forest of Harvard University, in Petersham, MA.

New

By: Lynda V Mapes(Author)

272 pages, 40 b/w illustrations

Publisher: University of Washington Press

Media reviews

"The balance of beauty and science found in Mapes' writing is certain to leave readers with a desire to act."
– Booklist

"Lynda Mapes brings you on a beautiful journey into the lush old-growth forests of the Pacific Northwest, sharing the health benefits of trees, and inviting readers to listen and learn from their story, to understand how essential these forests are to our very survival."
– Charlotte Coté, author of A Drum in One Hand, a Sockeye in the Other

"Lynda's elegant poetry of the old forests of North America stirs in our souls our deep connections to these majestic ecosystems. But more than this, she delivers a clarion call to protect the remaining old forests from completely going extinct from human exploitation. This book will surely move us to act for the trees."
– Suzanne Simard, author of Finding the Mother Tree

"A profound and enlightening exploration of the critical connection between old growth forests and salmon habitat, offering a hopeful vision for their recovery and permanency."
– Thomas DeLuca, Dean of the College of Forestry at the Oregon State University

"With a scientist's care and a poet's sense of wonder, Mapes artfully weaves the story of our continent's glorious, imperiled old-growth trees – and the countless organisms, from herring to humans, whose futures depend upon their survival."
– Ben Goldfarb, award-winning author of Crossings and Eager

"Life on earth is intricately entwined with forests. In this book Mapes eloquently tells the story about both the gifts of the forest and the challenges it faces."
– Joan Maloof, founder of the Old-Growth Forest Network and author of Nature's Temples: A Natural History of Old-Growth Forests

"Lynda Mapes is one of the great truth-tellers of our time. In her voice, the trees speak eloquently and urgently about the calamitour destruction of America's great old forests and the promise in ancient and new forest healing practice. Like Silent Spring, like The End of Nature, this is an essential read."
– Kathleen Dean Moore, author of Earth's Wild Music