
The Secret Life of Trees
How They Live and Why They Matter
Colin Tudge(Author)
Penguin Books Ltd (Publisher)
Published on 6. July 2006
Book
Paperback/Softback
464 pages
978-0-14-101293-3 (ISBN)
Description
Colin Tudge's The Secret Life of Trees: How they Live and Why they Matter explores the hidden role of trees in our everyday lives - and how our future survival depends on them.
What is a tree? As this celebration of the trees shows, they are our countryside; our ancestors descended from them; they gave us air to breathe. Yet while the stories of trees are as plentiful as leaves in a forest, they are rarely told.
Here, Colin Tudge travels from his own back garden round the world to explore the beauty, variety and ingenuity of trees everywhere: from how they live so long to how they talk to each other and why they came to exist in the first place. Lyrical and evocative, this book will make everyone fall in love with the trees around them.
'A love-letter to trees'
Financial Times
'One of those books you want everyone to have already read'
Sunday Telegraph
'Wonderful, invaluable and timely. Tudge is as illuminating a guide as one could wish for'
Daily Mail
'Everyone interested in the natural world will enjoy The Secret Life of Trees. I found myself reading out whole chunks to friends'
The Times Books of the Year
Colin Tudge started his first tree nursery in his garden aged 11, marking his life-long interest in trees. Always interested in plants and animals, he studied zoology at Cambridge and then began writing about science, first as features editor at the New Scientist and then as a documentary maker for the BBC. Now a full-time writer, he is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London and visiting Research Fellow at the Centre of Philosophy at the London School of Economics. His books include The Variety of Life and So Shall We Reap.
What is a tree? As this celebration of the trees shows, they are our countryside; our ancestors descended from them; they gave us air to breathe. Yet while the stories of trees are as plentiful as leaves in a forest, they are rarely told.
Here, Colin Tudge travels from his own back garden round the world to explore the beauty, variety and ingenuity of trees everywhere: from how they live so long to how they talk to each other and why they came to exist in the first place. Lyrical and evocative, this book will make everyone fall in love with the trees around them.
'A love-letter to trees'
Financial Times
'One of those books you want everyone to have already read'
Sunday Telegraph
'Wonderful, invaluable and timely. Tudge is as illuminating a guide as one could wish for'
Daily Mail
'Everyone interested in the natural world will enjoy The Secret Life of Trees. I found myself reading out whole chunks to friends'
The Times Books of the Year
Colin Tudge started his first tree nursery in his garden aged 11, marking his life-long interest in trees. Always interested in plants and animals, he studied zoology at Cambridge and then began writing about science, first as features editor at the New Scientist and then as a documentary maker for the BBC. Now a full-time writer, he is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London and visiting Research Fellow at the Centre of Philosophy at the London School of Economics. His books include The Variety of Life and So Shall We Reap.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 199 mm
Width: 129 mm
Thickness: 29 mm
Weight
342 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-14-101293-3 (9780141012933)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
07/2006
1st Edition
Penguin Books Ltd
€10.99
Available for download
Person
Colin Tudge started his first tree nursery in his garden aged 11, marking his life-long interest in trees. Always interested in plants and animals, he studied zoology at Cambridge and then began writing about science, first as features editor at the New Scientist and then as a documentary maker for the BBC. Now a full-time writer, he appears regularly as a public speaker, particularly for the British Council and is a Fellow of the Linnean Society of London and visiting Research Fellow at the Centre of Philosophy at the London School of Economics. His books include The Variety of Life and So Shall We Reap.
The Secret Life of Trees brings together Colin Tudge's knowledge of trees and his fascination with them, built up from trips to the rainforest in Costa Rica, Panama and Brazil, to his time India, New Zealand, China, the United States ... and his own back garden. He is unable to choose a favourite tree, believing that variety's the thing.
The Secret Life of Trees brings together Colin Tudge's knowledge of trees and his fascination with them, built up from trips to the rainforest in Costa Rica, Panama and Brazil, to his time India, New Zealand, China, the United States ... and his own back garden. He is unable to choose a favourite tree, believing that variety's the thing.