through the fungi that act
as
the forest internet.
(You can read all about this in Chapter 3.) When the
news gets out, even trees that like to guzzle water
begin to cut back.
*
The forest's water supply is constantly refilled by rain
and snow. To catch every possible drop of
rain,
decid-
uous
trees such
as
beech and oak angle their branches
up into the air to act
as
big funnels. The rain runs along
their branches to the trunk, where it shoots down to
the ground. Sometimes so much water runs down the
trunk that it froths up when it hits the ground.
Conifers are not as good at catching
rain.
Many
of them come from colder places, so they're better
prepared for snow
than
for dry weather, After
a
snowfall,
their flexible branches hang down close to their trunks
so the tree doesn't fall over under the heavy snow.
This doesn't work with deciduous trees. Their
branches reach up to the sky, and they would break
off under
a
heavy load of
snow.
That's why these trees
drop their leaves in the
fall.
Then the snow can simply
fall between the bare branches right onto the ground.
The branches of conifers work well to shed snow,
but not so well to catch
rain.
Because conifers are
narrow at the top and their branches angle out or down
rather than up, they act like umbrellas. This means the
ground around the trunks of conifers often stays very
dry, and in the summer the trees can be very thirsty.
Being Thirsty Hurts!
ft
thirsty tree's trunk can tear when
it
tries
to such water from dry ground.
IF IT'S A
VERY
ORY
SUMMER
and
spruces
continue
to
suck water out of the
ground,
especially greedy
trees can split open along the length of their
trunks.
That's a
bad
injury for
a
tree.
Thick drops
of pitch seep out of the wound (pitch is like the
blood of the spruce tree], and the wound never
really heals. That tree will have a
long,
seeping
scar down its bark for the rest of its life.
With their wide crowns, beech trees con capture a
lot of
rain and direct
it
down their trunks
to
the ground.
Just like other living things, trees need water. And because they are the elephants
of the plant
world,
they need a lot of it. On a hot summer day, a large beech
tree can easily drink up three or four bathtubs full of water.
OF COURSE,
THERE
ARE NO
BATHTUBS
in the forest,
which means that beech trees have to get every
drop of water from the ground. They do this
using their roots to feel for the spots where
it's nice and moist.
Once they've found a moist spot, they
quickly
