Imagine a forest full of hardwoods (leafy trees). Then imagine towering sentinel Pines standing a full tree length above the rest. Now imagine a full forest of these Pines. That is what the North woods of eastern North America use to look like. Today, the Eastern White Pine is scarcely a remnant of what it use to be. The reason? It built America. A foundational tree in every sense of the word. White Pine is a keystone species, an ecological driver and one of the tallest, straightest, and fattest trees in the North woods. John Pastor came on the podcast to tell the human and ecological history of this species, and it truly opened my eyes.
Resources
White Pine: The Natural and Human History of a Foundational American Tree by John Pastor
What Should a Clever Moose Eat? Natural History, Ecology, and the North Woods by John Pastor
Donald Culross Peattie’s writing
Paul Dayton’s work on kelp forests
The Maine Woods by Henry David Theroux
Suzanne Simard’s work on mycorrhizae
Northwoods Notebook by John Rajala
Ecological Silviculture by Brian Palik and others
Sponsors
Quotes
11.01 - 11.16: “Foundational species are a large, generally long-lived plant at the base of the food web that, because of their relatively large size in that ecosystem… control the food web and movement of energy and nutrients in the food web.”
20.29 - 20.38: “Most of what a forester thinks about is not cutting up the trees that are there, but the next generation and the next generation after that.”
28.25 - 28.30: “More revenue was generated by harvesting white pine than all the gold in California.”
Takeaways
“The tree that feels like home” (05.07)
John’s father was a carpenter and cabinet maker whose favourite wood was white pine, so John grew up around white pine. John’s research has also mostly been on the Northwoods boreal forest which has always had white pine around. White pine also defines how he thinks of forests. His book, White Pine, follows his previous book about the Northwoods and was encouraged by his editor as an extended essay about white pines.
A foundational species (09.08)
John finds that other naturalists also celebrate the white pine in their writings, and he attributes this to two reasons: ecologically, it’s the largest tree in the Northwoods whose large biomass enables it to capture a lot of the sun’s energy that froze into the food web. It also allows it to control the cycling of nutrients through the food web by the uptake of nutrients and then shedding the needles, which has a major influence on the soil. Other foundational species are douglas fir in the pacific northwest, redwoods, Sonoran cactus in the Sonoran desert, Big Bluestem in the prairies, and kelp in the marine ecosystem.
Cultural significance of white pine (12.39)
White pine forms a part of American and Canadian folklore, highlighting the importance of wilderness. John shares that Native Americans, particularly the Iroquois and the Algonquins (the Anishinabe) revered white pine. The Iroquois associate the 5 needle pines with the 5 original nations of the Iroquois Confederacy. He claims that forest ecology in the USA has revolved around protecting the remaining white pine and restoring what has been logged.
High grading or forestry? (16.24)
John acknowledges that logging helped people build homes, workplaces and bridges without importing. White pine is big and gave a lot of clear lumber, could be cut into large sizes for large construction, and back then, seemed to be infinite. Voyagers kept going west as white pine in the east began dwindling, after 300 years of harvesting. He shares the example of Weyerhaeuser, and quotes the numbers of white pine then and now, to highlight how little of the original white pine forest in the USA remains today. Fires then burned a lot of the uncut forests.
“The tree that made North America” (28.31)
John notes that harvesting white pine generated more revenue than mining had till the 1900s. White pine lumber was used by the colonists to build large ships and sell lumber to France and Spain, making it a big part of the economy of the colonies, particularly New England. The colonists were not happy to share the lumber they harvested with England. The parliament passed laws marking white pines larger than 24” as reserved for the King, which resulted in a riot. The white pine then became a symbol of economic, political and cultural independence.
What Nature means (38.53)
John points out that European settlers relied on Indigenous Peoples to guide them through the land but did not respect the treaties made with them, which only existed to gain access to the land. “Europeans looked at natural resources as a commodity they needed to build civilization; First Nations looked at themselves as a part of nature”, he comments. He observes that the First Nations have built a culture around revering nature, which caused the clash between Indigenous Peoples and the settlers.
They can choose not to share their stories (46.22)
John is hopeful about the growing collaboration between foresters, ecologists and land managers and Indigenous Peoples. He cautions any white listeners not to demand Indigenous peoples share their stories. He narrates his experience in gaining the trust of the Elders in any Indigenous community before going to their land to conduct research. Europeans took the seedlings from this land to grow white pines in their countries and sent some back to replant with diseases in them. This triggered the plant quarantine act in the USA.
Magical mycorrhizae (59.48)
John discusses mycorrhizae, the symbiotic relationships between plant roots and fungi. Fungi extend the rooting system of the tree and provide nutrients and water through its mycelium while the tree provides the fungi with carbohydrates from photosynthesis. Research has revealed that these extended root systems connect different species of trees too, creating an entire underground network in a forest. Mycorrhizae have helped restore white pine and protect forest cover.
Fire protects forests (1.07.31)
John shares the story of a forest ecologist who inspired him, recalling how he would deduce the fire history of a forest by inspecting an oak tree wedge and guessing the age of the forest. As white pine grows old, the canopy grows rougher and becomes irregular. He created maps of the landscape using this knowledge. Thinning of young pines helped preserve the forest since the larger, older pines were more fire-tolerant due to their thick corky bark. This also helped people shift their perspective of fire.
Ecological forestry (1.18.31)
John explains how the understanding of ecology has been expanded by ecologists to be greater than the sum of its parts using the example of the spotted owl. He does agree with the “save all the parts” philosophy but also sees the role timber plays in maintaining the sustainability of human populations. Many foresters today are mindful that their role is not to supply timber but to preserve the planet for future generations.
An experiment in forest management (1.27.28)
John believes that only successful forests which produce high-quality lumber are able to afford ecological silvicultural management of the forest. He discusses the difficulties in maintaining the different types of forests. “Once you have a healthy forest… you don’t need to invest that much money in maintaining it and rejuvenating it because you get more valuable timber out of it”, he highlights.
Looking to the future (1.32.43)
John summarizes that throughout history, each way of looking at forests has built upon and been added to the previous. Some views are coming into conflict now, but science will always take precedence when making decisions about the future of the forest. However, he says, “We don’t know enough about how forest ecosystems work as a system to be able to predict” the future. Though that can be frustrating for some, it is exciting for John to discover how he can leave a legacy for this future generations.
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