How to Read a Tree: Clues and Patterns from Bark to Leaves

“The Sherlock Holmes of Nature”―BBC

“Reams of appealing facts make one itch to get outside and right up close to trees’ rough surfaces and shady cover.”―The Atlantic

Open your eyes to the secret language of trees

Trees tell a story, but only to those who know how to read it. They hold secrets about the land, the water, the people, the animals, the weather, time―and their own lives, the good and bad. 

In How to Read a Tree, Gooley uncovers the clues hiding in plain sight: in a tree’s branches and leaves; its bark, buds, and flowers; even its stump. Leaves with a pale, central streak mean that water is nearby. Young, low-growing branches show that a tree is struggling. And reddish or purple bark signals new growth. Like snowflakes, no two trees are exactly the same. Every difference reveals the epic story this tree has lived―if we stop to look closely.

Two 8-page color photo inserts | 34 B&W illustrations

Tristan Gooley is the New York Times–bestselling author of How to Read Water, How to Read Nature, The Natural Navigator, The Lost Art of Reading Nature’s Signs, The Secret World of Weather, The Nature Instinct, How to Read a Tree, and The Hidden Seasons. He has led expeditions on five continents, climbed mountains in three, and is the only living person to have both flown and sailed solo across the Atlantic. His more than two decades of pioneering outdoor experience include research among tribal peoples in some of the remotest regions on Earth. He is a Fellow of the Royal Institute of Navigation and the Royal Geographical Society, a vice-chairman of Trailfinders, and he runs the world’s only school of natural navigation.