From My Nature Journal: Healing Trees and Living Stumps

Just a half-mile walk up Parker Road from our Coupeville, Washington home is a gem of an attraction gifted to the region by a generous neighbor, the Price Sculpture Forest. A sixteen-acre parcel that had originally been slated for development, it was put under a conservation easement several years ago and a lovely sculpture park developed in its place, opening to the public free of charge in 2021. Trails lead visitors past numerous marvelous sculptures by various U.S. and foreign artists, complete with QR codes that bring detailed information to our phones, including recorded commentary by many of the sculptors themselves. All pieces are placed in such a way that another cannot be seen while in another’s viewing area. Gail and I often take visitors here; even our young grandchildren never tire of visiting. They all seem to have the same favorite, too, which will go unidentified here; suffice it to say it usually takes first-timers by surprise as they come around a bend in the trail. The sculpture forest has even prompted some of our grands from time to time while visiting to create natural sculptures on a small trail on our own little wooded acre.

The uniqueness and, for me, truer beauty of the attraction, however, is the natural setting in which it lies: note that it is not titled a sculpture park, like so many others, but a sculpture forest. Towering Douglas firs, western red cedars and western hemlocks (the Washington State Tree) surround the sightseer as they walk, drawing the eyes not only out but to the heavens. What is extra special to any naturalist, though, is that the trails lead the saunterer by unique natural features that are also intentionally highlighted (though not interpreted like the sculptures, my only disappointment!) – rarer trees such as the Pacific Yew, native understory, a tall fir with an eagle aerie, large sword fern groves, beautifully blooming (when in season) Coastal Rhododendrons (the Washington State Flower), and massive stumps from giant old growth logged out in the 1800’s. Oh, and several living stumps.

Living stumps? Yes. There are actually several in the sculpture forest if one pays attention. The first and easiest to see is just off the parking lot inside the trail’s entry. It caught my eye upon my very first visit and I had to do a double take, even said to Gail, “Look at this stump! It seems to have healed completely over and the bark even looks fresh. What in the world?” I looked it up when I got home and, sure enough, though rare, it’s a thing. 

As you know, when a single-stemmed plant is cut, even a tree, the plant usually dies. Whether cultivated tulips or daffodils or wild daisies or yarrows, cut them to bring them inside for a table bouquet and the original plant will shrivel and dry, eventually decomposing and sending its nourishment back into the ground. The same is true of trees, though their remnants decompose much more slowly. Now, of course some root systems of deciduous species are vigorous enough that a tree will push up what are called suckers, though they are not suckers at all, just the tree trying to hold on to life. Suckers can grow to become trees in their own right and live for decades more. And though such species as maples and willows can do this fairly often, the cut trunk never heals. But there’s something in conifers where a stump can occasionally heal given the right conditions. 

As I’ve written before on this blog, conifers have shallow root systems that intertwine with those of other nearby trees, even of differing species, essentially holding each other up through tempestuous winds. (A sermon there, for sure!) It’s one reason why one is more likely to see a wild and live conifer broken by the wind than uprooted by it, unless it’s a loner on someone’s city lawn. On rare occasions, two nearby trees of the same conifer species will not only entwine roots but some will actually graft to each other. Only when this happens can the healing actions in a live tree be shared with a cut one nearby, and even then it doesn’t happen frequently. 

When a healthy tree of any species is itself wounded – say, a storm takes a big branch off your maple or an arborist prunes your fruit tree – the tree’s healing mechanisms go into action. Increased sap is sent to the spot. In the healthiest trees, something called a callus grows over the wound looking like young, smooth bark and sealing it from destructive elements. And the tree stays healthy. 

All living stumps have a vigorous sister tree growing quite near that, through their grafted roots, initiated the healing process. With this particular specimen in the Price Sculpture Forest, a tree was cut years ago. (How long? I’d like to know!). A nearby tree with which it had grafted some of its roots rushed sap to the wound. (Conifers have an especially good resin for healing – think pine tar from which amber is formed or turpentine made – so good that even humans have used it for healing purposes for millennia.) This pungent resin helps prevent the entry of pathogens and disease, and a callus eventually covered it. The system stayed healthy and vigorous and, finally, bark formed, as you can see in the photo. Voila! A living stump! The cut tree’s stump not only stays alive but some of its roots now even draw water and mineral nourishment to the sister tree, strengthening the system further.  

Certain species of tree show this marvel more often than others, and one of these is the Douglas fir. The three examples I’ve seen in the Price Sculpture Forest are all Doug Firs, and just yesterday I found another live stump of the same species while walking a mile further east on Parker Road; it was larger but covered with thick moss and beginning some serious decomposition. Did it finally die? Perhaps. But there was not a healthy sister tree nearby either. The only other live stump I’ve seen in as good and ‘alive’ a condition as the first I saw there in the sculpture forest is one I came across last summer along the Rogue River Gorge in southern Oregon while visiting that area with friends. It even had an interpretive sign. 

Now, crazily, even after a good bit of research, I still have not discovered a common name for this phenomenon, and, in my humble opinion (which is sometimes not so humble), such a thing should definitely have a name worthy of it! One very dry article called it ‘a graft and callus.’ Another simply referred to it by the action that was taking place, ‘hydrological coupling.’ How utterly disappointing! The thing seems to me a minor miracle! Even trees can be meant for healing in community? Marvelous! And so our nearby sculpture forest is a good place for this minor miracle, as a living stump is one of God’s cooler sculptures! 

Jesus is prophesied in the Bible as a shoot that will grow from a stump, the line of King David, and has served as one “…who heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” Followers of Jesus are intended to be agents of this same kind of healing and mercy by demonstrating God’s love and grace to all people through acts of kindness, forgiveness and prayer. The Bible even speaks of a tree that exists for the purpose of the healing of the nations (Revelation 22:1-2). How we need all three of these today – Jesus, Christians who live like Christians, and a tree that might heal the nations.

~~ RGM, February 25, 2025

From My Nature Journal: Recruitment from the Seed Bank

Amateur naturalists frequently encounter provocative things as they observe creation, things they may never have seen before and perhaps never will again. Presenting themselves by direct experience, all one needs to do is pay good attention to their surroundings and ask inquisitive mental questions about what one is observing. But alternately, as we continue to seek understanding, we go deeper and learn through our reading. We come across details that have been studied by scientists in differing fields, and are often introduced to concepts that become equally intriguing. I recently ran into one such as I was reading about invasive plants: recruitment from the seed bank.

Anyone who pays attention to plants has encountered invasives -- whether kudzu in the Southeast, tamarisk in the Southwest, Scotch broom or English ivy in the Northwest, knotweed in the Northeast, milfoil in northern lakes or knapweed in the Midwest. My interest last week was purple loosestrife, a beautiful species brought to the USA as a cultivar in the 1800’s for
ornamental and medicinal use. In the last several decades it has proliferated such, especially in wet, marshy areas, that there are several states that have banned its sale. Like other invasives it chokes out native plants, and is especially damaging to species, both flora and fauna, already under other threats. We often see it in our travels across the northern states. 

But here’s the particular problem with loosestrife. It can grow to seven feet or more and can put out 2 to 3 million seeds per plant, regularly overwhelming nearby terrain in a hurry. And what’s worse is that the seeds are opportunists, and can lay dormant for years until just the right (or wrong!) ground disturbance brings them to the surface, presenting their perfect growing conditions; they then multiply so quickly that the land steward doesn’t know what hit them, and very soon it’s too late to manage. Recruitment from the seed bank, botanists call it. 

Now, that’s a rich concept, and it got me to thinking about just how much, and in just how many ways, that reality is active in our lives. And it can go either direction – to our or others’ benefit or to our or others’ detriment. Choosing to love makes for future recruitment from the seed bank. But so does choosing to hate. Small acts of kindness and mercy pay seeds forward. They come back to us. But so does the holding of resentment, or the withholding of forgiveness. Faith is a powerful investment in the seed bank. But a critical spirit is also; it’s just in the opposite direction to something positive. Even such things as people of faith memorizing Bible verses becomes a contribution to some kind of an endowment fund, what the Bible speaks of as ‘hiding God’s word in our hearts,’ so that its truth will come back to us in specific situations when we need it the most. I love the way Eugene Peterson paraphrased Psalm 119:11 – “I’ve banked your promises in the vault of my heart so I will not sin myself bankrupt.”

Choosing to love makes for future recruitment

from the seed bank. Small acts of kindness and

mercy do the same. They come back to us.

Each of the above practices – loving, hating, showing mercy, resenting, withholding forgiveness, acting in faith, criticizing, committing the Bible to memory – each of them stores up seeds for the future. Each of them, and so many more, bear fruit in times when the right (or wrong) conditions come calling. The question is, is it good fruit or bad? Is it a welcome wildflower or an invasive or noxious weed? Does it build up or destroy?

A beloved seminary professor of mine described even church work in this way as the constant planting of seeds. And I have surely found this to be so as a pastor. Things ‘sown’ one day may sprout quickly or can take an excruciatingly long time to produce an effect. These latter can lie buried. They’re dormant, but not dead, kept from action until a disturbance. My prof called pastoral work ‘soil work,’ preparation of the seed bank. We constantly lay the seed, then wait and watch for a disturbance – ‘a crisis, a visitation of the Holy Spirit to recruit the seed, surface it and let it sprout.’ 

But it’s not just true of pastoring work. It’s true of parenting work, of marriage work, in fact of all relational work. So, sow only good seed. Sow a LOT of it. Then trust God’s recruitment from your seed bank.

~~ RGM, July 27 2024

From My Nature Journal: It Had Been a Good Day for a Naturalist…

Up until the late evening, Monday had been a very good day for an amateur naturalist on vacation.

That morning while sitting at the end of the dock I watched an eagle take a fish from the channel. This natural drama is always exciting to witness, with the eagle coming up empty more often than not. But when it is successful, it is an absolutely remarkable feat of body control, aeronautic timing, beauty, and, if I may wax anthropomorphic, grace.

Later that afternoon on my daily walk, I ran across a beautiful set of fresh moose tracks. A solitary animal had entered County Road 206 from the thick Ottawa National Forest woods to the north, walked west about 75 yards on the rain-softened gravel, then cut abruptly into the woods to the south. I had not seen the tracks the day before, so they were put down sometime the previous evening or early that morning, the times of day these enormous and ungainly animals are most active. And since it had been a long while since I’d seen fresh moose sign around here, I was just very pleased to know they are still around. Some day I may be blessed enough to see one, as have some of our neighbors.

Then that evening after supper, Gail and I took to the water to go scouting the status of the lake’s new loons. We knew the floating platform here in our bay had been successful, with two chicks coming off it on Independence Day, thus receiving the nicknames George and Tom. And though we had heard that the other platform on the lake had not had a successful hatching this year, our kids told us they had seen another adult pair feeding a lone chick further down the lake. Maybe another had come the natural way, from somewhere ashore, though the birds have vastly preferred the platforms in recent years. Sure enough, we spotted the family from our bay on the north end of the lake, where they tend to stay, and the family with the single chick on the south end. Score three chicks this year for Beatons Lake.

And to close out the outdoor portion of the day, the ‘seeing’ that night had been fantastic. Sky watching has always been a particular delight, and the Northwoods never disappoint on a clear night. The Milky Way was brilliant and the constellations and asterisms clear as a bell, with numerous shooting stars and satellites amplifying the sky’s three-dimensionality.

Yes, it had been a good day for an amateur naturalist. But then came my late evening reading, which made me feel like an absolute lightweight, just a naturalist ‘wannabee.’ I’m reading through a book by Jon Young called What the Robin Knows: How Birds Reveal the Secrets of the Natural World. It belongs to my sister, who often shares great nature reads with me; but once again, it’s one of those books that make me feel like a know-nothing. After observing and studying nature since childhood, I sometimes think I’m stuck in kindergarten in God’s nature school. The book is about deep observation, in this case, deep birding; it’s the kind of observation that not only allows one to know a lot of things about a species, but even know things about an individual bird, so one may be able to successfully read its cues and clues. Take this for example:

If one day I see a small bird and recognize it, a thin thread will form between me and that bird. If I just see it but don’t really recognize it, there is no thin thread. If I go out tomorrow and see and really recognize that same individual small bird again, the thread will thicken and strengthen just a little. Every time I see and recognize that bird, the thread strengthens. Eventually it will grow into a string, then a cord, and finally a rope. This is what it means to be [a naturalist]. We make ropes with all aspects of the creation this way.

I guess I may not be the naturalist I thought! Have I ever been able to tell one robin from another by the depth of my observation? No! This guy’s birding knowledge puts me to shame. And though I know it’s my personal insecurities at play here, I read this genre to be inspired to go deeper, not to be shamed!!! Still, I’ll persevere. After all, I’m only a quarter of the way through the book. Perhaps there will still be some ‘baby steps’ he’ll share that will be more suitable for a lightweight like me.

For now, I’ll have to be content… that the

first step to being a naturalist is to love…

For now, I’ll have to continue to be content with something I’ve long believed, that the first step to being a naturalist is to love, to love God’s creation. There’s so much to see, so much to know, so much beauty to observe, so much that nature can teach (not the least of which is humility!), all of which leads me to the Creator and to the truth of the Bible:

Ask the animals and they will teach you,

The birds of the heavens and they will tell you.

Speak to the plants of the earth and they will inform you,

Even the fish of the sea will declare to you:

Who among all these does not know that

The hand of the Lord has done this?

In His hand is the life of every living thing,

Even the breath of all humankind.

                                                                                    (Job 12:7-10)

~~ RGM, August 24 2020

P.S. I just shared that Bible passage last week at the memorial service of a dear naturalist friend who recently died. Peace to the memory of my friend Bob, who also knew countless good days enjoying God’s creation.

From My Nature Journal: Soul Seasons

Lord of Creation, God of the universe,

You are not simply summer to my soul.

Yes, I do love You in the sensuousness of summer,

When leaves wax and fields are a riot of color and joy,

When Your sun warms my skin,

And Your cool water revives my strength,

And long days become a sabbath-season that allow space, grace and growth.

Yet I also love You in the melancholy of autumn,

When Your earth dies a blood-red blaze of glory

And trees rain back their yield to the ground,

When something in me saddens amid the late-season blessing,

And I come to terms with mortality and winter’s approach.

But I love You as well in the dead of winter,

When wind howls over barren earth

Both outside my window and sometimes inside my soul,

When the heart can freeze like ice, or can rest easy, asleep,

Like a garden, patiently waiting for Your beneficent, restoring touch.

Finally, I love You in the giddy burgeoning of springtime,

When quickened life bursts from somewhere deep and wonderful,

A resurrected earth mimicking a resurrected Lord,

And something also in me is embraced by resurrection,

As the cycle of life again begins its turning.

You are every season to my soul --

Summer, fall, winter, spring -- together.

You transcend them in a timeless time and space beyond Your good earth.

Grant me to walk fully awake through the seasons,

Never missing the slightest nuance of Your vast overture of love. Amen

~~ RGM, December 7, 2017