Connecting with Trees: The Songs of Trees & Longwood Gardens
Longwood Gardens 2022 Community Read
Introduction
What would a tree tell us if we just took the time to listen? That’s one of the essential ideas we encourage our Community Readers to explore in 2022. Trees are nature’s great connectors and help us gain insight into ourselves and our place in the world. Trees represent growth, peace, and nature while teaching us how to plant deep roots and reach for the sky. In The Songs of Trees, journey around the world with David Haskell as he repeatedly visits 12 trees and shows how human history, ecology, and well-being are intimately intertwined.
This StoryMap experience will bring you along to Haskell’s trees around the globe and introduce you to some of their relatives here at Longwood Gardens. On your journey, make sure to have your volume turned on, or headphones plugged in, to hear the sounds Haskell recorded on location bringing these trees stories to life.
Interactive Tree Map
Where in the world are Haskell's Trees? Take a look at the map below to find the fourteen trees Haskell visits in The Songs of Trees. After exploring the map, keep scrolling to visit a selection of these trees.
How to navigate map:
Navigate the map by clicking and dragging your cursor. Zoom in and out by scrolling.
Click on a tree icon to learn more information about that tree, such as the botanical name and location.
Zoom to a specific tree by using the bookmark button in the top right-hand corner of the map screen and clicking the tree you are looking for.
Return to the full map view by pressing the home button in the top left-hand corner of the map.
The Songs of Trees: Stories from Nature's Great Connectors
“…Living memories of trees, manifest in their songs, tell of life’s community, a net of relations. We humans belong within this conversation, as blood kin and incarnate members. To listen is therefore to hear our voices and those of our family.” (p. vii)
"Because life is network, there is no 'nature' or 'environment,' separate and apart from humans" (p. viii)
Ceibo
Ceiba pentandra
Audio clip: "Rain falling under Ceibo" - 28 seconds.
“The forest is the place where biological hubris dies: we live in profound ignorance of the lives of our cousins” (p. 10).
An image of a pale pink & yellow sunrise from a canopy of Ceibo trees. There is mist covering the lower reaches of the canopy.
Ceibo
Located near the Tiputini River, Ecuador
Coordinates: 0°38’10.2″ S, 76°08’39.5″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
Longwood Gardens' Ceiba Tree
Ceibo, or Kapok-tree, is pictured here with thorny bark and a philodendron climbing up the trunk
Close up of Ceiba erianthos.
Designed by renowned Landscape Architect Roberto Burle Marx, Longwood’s Cascade Garden is home to Ceiba erianthos, a cousin to the towering Ceiba pentadra—or kapok tree—featured in Haskell’s book.
Visitors to Longwood might remember our kapok tree by the thick thorns clustered on its trunk—an intriguing sight that snags your attention and beckons you closer in wonder. This singular specimen is a beautiful reminder of the stunningly diverse ecosystems across our planet, and especially the Amazonian rainforest, which contains biological diversity at a scale yet unknown.
"Over the life span of a sabal palm tree, often longer than a century...the forces of the waves and moving sand have molded every part of the sabal palm's existence, from its body to its fruits, its early growth, and the chemistry in the cells in its leaves" (p. 64).
Sabal Palm
Located on St. Catherine's Island, Georgia
Coordinates: 31°35’40.4″ N, 81°09’02.2″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
Fallen sabal palm on a sandy beach.
Longwood Gardens' Sabal Palm
A close-up image of a fan-shaped palm frond.
Court of Palms - Sabal palmetto
Longwood’s grand Conservatory gardens have long featured native and exotic palm trees, which provide a pleasing variety of height and texture in our displays. Sabal palmetto is one of a small number of palms native to the United States.
It has found a permanent home in Longwood’s East Conservatory, where it is a stalwart backdrop to the ever-changing seasonal displays.
European Hazel
Corylus avellana
Audio clip: "Hazel nutshell" - 21 seconds
"...northern Europe's forests have lived in relationship with people from their origins in glacial rumble through to the present day. At no point were these forests primeval, unpeopled wilderness. Modern forestry in the region is therefore a continuation of an interaction as old as the forest itself" (p. 115).
An image of cracked hazelnut shells from an archaeological dig.
European Hazel
Located in South Queensferry, Scotland
Coordinates: 55°59’27.4″ N, 3°25’09.3″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
An image of two immature hazelnuts from a European hazel bush. The bracts are green and partially cover an off-white fruit.
Immature Corylus americana nut
Longwood Gardens' Hazel
Author Haskell describes the European hazel as “the staple on which people built their lives” during the Mesolithic era. For thousands of years, the native Lenni Lenape tribe fished the streams, hunted the forests,
and planted the fields in this region of southeastern Pennsylvania. American hazelnut (or filbert) Corylus americana has been documented as an important Native American medicine and food source for centuries.
At Longwood today, American hazelnut trees can be found near the Birdhouse Treehouse, where the nuts are a favorite of browsing wildlife.
Redwood and Ponderosa Pine
Sequoia sempervirens and Pinus ponderosa
Audio clip: "Ponderosa drying" - 41 seconds
“Trees are the Platos of biology. Through their Dialogues, they are the best-placed creatures of all to make aesthetic and ethical judgements about beauty and good in the world.” (p. 153)
A giant Sequoia stump covered in snow, with ponderosa pine trees on a hill in the background.
Redwood and Ponderosa Pine
Located in Florissant, Colorado
Coordinates: 38°55’06.7″ N, 105°17’10.1″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
Longwood Gardens' Redwood
Giant Sequoia
Sequoiadendron giganteum
This image shows a slice of the inner rings of a Giant Redwood. On the left side, several date markers indicate the approximate year of each growth ring.
Sequoia Tree Ring
This tree section from a Giant Sequoia or redwood (Sequoiadendron giganteum) almost dates to the time of Plato - it was estimated to be about 2,100 years old when it fell in 1916. It stood sentinel in California’s Sequoia National Park, bearing witness to its changing surroundings throughout the centuries.
Longwood’s founder, Pierre S. du Pont, acquired this section (cut 100 feet from the base of the 290-foot-tall tree) in 1929 and had it shipped by rail to Longwood. The arrows on the slab point to annual growth rings; each ring represents one year’s growth, with dates indicating when important events took place during the life of this once majestic tree.
Maple
unknown Acer species
Audio clip: "Maple April 28 to May 17" - 21 seconds
"All summer long the forest throbs with the water-blood heartbeat of twigs. With sensors on other branches in the maple tree I hear how these heartbeats vary" (p.160).
A sensor device attached to a twig of a maple tree in autumn.
Maple
Located in Sewanee Tennessee
Coordinates: 35°11’46.0″ N, 85°55’05.5″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
Maple
Located in Chicago, Illinois
Coordinates: 41°52’46.6″ N, 87°37’35.7″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
Longwood Gardens' Maples
A red Maple with red & orange fall color stands with a lawn in the foreground and a meadow in the background.
Acer saccharum's Autumn colours in the Meadow Garden.
Once the wood of the sugar maple (Acer saccharum)
becomes timber, it no longer flows with a “water-blood heartbeat” - but it can make music nonetheless. Durable and hard, it can be machined to the fine tolerances important in the creation of musical instruments, including guitars, violins, violas and cellos. Strong timber is essential in stringed instruments, because it is the ability of the neck to resist bending that allows the instrument to hold a constant pitch.
Longwood hosts 97 taxa and 47 species of maples at the Gardens. Check out a tour of tree species found at Longwood Gardens that are traditionally used for making musical instruments: Note-worthy Trees in the Garden
Olive
Olea europea
“Studies of the genetics of olive trees show that almost all the olive trees in the Mediterranean, whether in a ‘wild’ area or in an orchard, descend from cultivars. Trees whose genealogy has not intersected with the hands of humans are very rare. The well-being and persistence of humans and olive trees have been conjoined for thousands of years” (p. 229).
An olive tree next to the gates of Damascus.
Olive
Located in Jerusalem, Israel
Coordinates: 31°46’54.6″ N, 35°13’49.0″ E
Haskell's Trees Map
An olive tree stands in the center of a circular fountain within a traffic circle.
Longwood Gardens' Olive
Longwood’s signature olive tree, in the indoor Silver Garden, has been connecting with guests since 1989. Renowned California landscape architect Isabelle Green anchored the western end of her modernist design of Mediterranean and desert climate plants with this symbol of peace.
During construction, we used a large crane to lower the fifteen-foot mature Californian olive tree into place inside the glasshouse. Read more about Longwood’s Silver Garden.
A large Olive Tree is hoisted in the air by a large crane, soon to be installed in the Silver Garden in Longwood Garden’s East Conservatory. A large wooden container holds the tree’s roots and is hanging high over the Conservatory.
An image of the Silver Garden in the East Conservatory at Longwood Gardens. A stone path leads to an olive tree with a rounded canopy, and silver and green succulents along the sides of the path.
An olive tree inside the Longwood Garden’s East Conservatory is lit up with light blue Christmas lights to highlight the canopy.
Japanese White Pine Bonsai
Pinus parviflora
“Like olive groves, bonsai trees bring to the surface what is harder to discern elsewhere: that human lives and tree lives are made, always, from relationship. For many trees it is nonhuman species – bacteria, fungi, insects, birds – that are the primary constituents of the network. Olive and bonsai trees bring humans to the center, giving us direct experience of the importance of sustained connection.” (p. 249-250)
A Yamaki pine tree bonsai on display in Washington, DC. The needles are upright and the photo centers on a twist in the trunk.
Japanese White Pine Bonsai
Located on Miyajima Island, Japan
Coordinates: 34°16’44.1″ N, 132°19’10.0″ E
Haskell's Trees Map
Japanese White Pine Bonsai
Located in Washington D.C.
Coordinates: 38°54’44.7″ N, 76°58’08.8″ W
Haskell's Trees Map
Longwood Gardens' Bonsai Collection
Longwood Gardens’ diverse bonsai collection demonstrates strong connection between grower and plant, requiring human intervention to embody the essence of beautiful and interesting full sized trees. Our bonsai growers are masters of the art and science of horticulture, creating living art pieces that never fail to connect with guests for their uniqueness, beauty, and longevity.
Left Image: This Ginkgo biloba tree was one of the 13 original bonsai trees that started Longwood’s collection.
Right Image: This Black Pine (Pinus Thunbergii) was acquired by Longwood in 1987 from the U.S. National Arboretum.
About Longwood Gardens
Black and white image of what is now Peirce's Park looking down an allee of large conifers.
This image looks down what is now Peirce's Park, taken from the vantage point of the Peirce-duPont House looking eastward toward the Sylvan Fountain.
The story of Longwood Gardens begins in Peirce’s Park, one of the nation’s first collections of trees, some of which are hundreds of years old. Pierre S. du Pont purchased the property that was to become Longwood Gardens in order to save the historic trees planted in this Garden.
During the 1800s, twins Joshua and Samuel Peirce collected many native and exotic trees, which they planted in straight rows on this land east of their farmhouse. This area became known as Peirce’s Park toward the end of the 19th century. Mr. du Pont purchased the Peirce farm and arboretum in 1906 to save the trees from being cut for lumber.
About Community Read
Community Read began in 2014 as a collaborative effort between Gardens and community to encourage conversations surrounding gardens, plants, or nature.
Today, Community Read features more than 50 partner organizations and has led to the donation of more than 10,000 books to area libraries.
Visit the Community Read page to learn more about Community Read 2022 and previous Community Read selections.
