The Trees Are Speaking: Dispatches from the Salmon Forests

by Lynda V. Mapes

A call to rethink our relationship with forests

Ancient and carbon-rich, old-growth forests play an irreplaceable role in the environment. Their complex ecosystems clean the air, purify the water, cool the planet, and teem with life. In a time of climate catastrophe, old-growth and other natural forests face existential threats caused by humans—and their survival is crucial to ours.

In a bicoastal journey, environmental journalist Lynda V. Mapes connects the present and future of Pacific Northwest forests to the hard-logged legacy forests of the northeastern United States. Beginning in Oregon and Washington, where old growth supports, and is supported by, the region’s salmon, we meet Jerry Franklin, who led scientists in recognizing and studying the distinctiveness of these majestic spaces. From there, we journey to Vancouver Island, where Indigenous activists and scientists strive to preserve the health of Nuu-chah-nulth traditional homelands amid continued clearcutting. On the East Coast, we see the corduroy patterns of lands that have been logged for generations, leaving industrial carnage along formerly life-filled waterways. Mapes interviews Penobscot elders and scientists whose new practices are restoring the fish runs, as well as loggers using new technologies to harvest more sustainably.

With vibrant storytelling supported by science and traditional ecological knowledge, Mapes invites readers to understand the world where trees are kin, not commodities. The Trees Are Speaking is essential reading for those with a deep interest in environmental stewardship, Indigenous land rights, and the urgent challenges posed by climate change.

Genres: Nature, Nonfiction, Ecology

272 pages, Hardcover

Published April 22, 2025

Reviews

[CatReader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lynda Mapes is an environmental journalist; her 2025 book The Trees Are Speaking focuses on the short-, mid-, and long-term environmental consequences of industrial depletion of old forests in areas including the Pacific Northwest (Vancouver, Canada; Oregon) and the Northeastern United States (Maine). Mapes includes many photos and interviews with indigenous peoples, forestry experts, and environmental researchers who speak to the delicate ecosystems and ways of life that have been largely permanently disrupted by the logging industry. Toward the end of the book, Mapes covers a few promising efforts toward more sustainable forestry practices.

This was an interesting read, though like many books in this niche, it overwhelmingly presents arguments from one perspective and doesn't give broader context, perspectives, or a more balanced consideration to the roots of the issue (pun intended), which in my opinion are the keys to stakeholder buy-in and enduring long-term solutions.

My statistics:
Book 281 for 2025
Book 2207 cumulatively

[Lathram · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eek! I loved this one. Part knowledge building, part science and policy analysis, part storytelling. Mainly focused on forests in the PNW and Maine. Thank you, Lynda Mapes from the Seattle Times.

Some appreciations:
I appreciated how Mapes led with indigenous knowledge and cultural protocols with the trees. I think this is particularly important in land-based conservation talk because it demystifies the idea that settlers arrived to an untouched landscape. And, it immediately centers a human and more-than-human relationship. Indigenous peoples have always been tending to and with the trees. She used a term new to me, “culturally modified trees,” to describe cedar and others where the bark was stripped but the tree repairs itself and remains intact, some still intact today.

I also appreciated her chapters on the impact of the timber industry on workers and towns built around the market. There are different stories she shares showing various experiences, like a Mowachaht elder who worked for logging crews cutting old growth in his homelands, who names regret and confusion about that time, and has committed much of his time since to protection of the land (p. 92). Another around a town built around a mill, now shut down and abandoned. And then today, a young couple in Maine running a small logging operation business where they’re hired to do the cutting, which is really skilled and tedious labor. Based on my experience, I agree that people doing this work, even if they are cutting trees, more often than not have a deep connection to the land, sometimes in a way they do not and cannot even acknowledge. This creates an interesting space for recognition of shared values.

Also! She does a nice job of exploring arguments for and against carbon sequestration.

What I’m teasing out:
The spectrum of “old-growth.” In today’s industrial timber market, old-growth can be used to describe a tree sometimes at 50 years (at determined economic maturity) when its actual old-growth age is closer to 500. There is a way this language is wielded for market use that disconnects us from the actual gestation period of a forest. This manipulation of natural forest time distorts the reality that trees beyond economic maturity have value – they have a lot of value (ecological, cultural, spiritual). When I say old-growth I mean old-growth. I think Mapes would agree with this, and her writing has me thinking about how those in various positions frame old-growth.

Clear-cut controversy (p. 151). Yes, I am anti-clearcutting. And yes, there is something about naturally clearing a space and place that gives way to the next generation. This happens naturally with fire-dependent forests, wildfires, hurricanes, etc. Obviously the human impact of climate change is impacting said examples of natural clearings. And, clear-cutting does not in any way mimic a natural clearing. But I’m sitting with this.

I could keep going and really write a review of each chapter, but you get the point, it was a good one.

In Defense of Land Everywhere !

[David Kessler · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best ecological book I have read.
Its topic is old growth forests in the NE and NW of the United States and in British Columbia.
The author spent years accumulating the information from experts in old growth forest studies.
Lynda Mapes has worked as an environmental writer for a large newspaper and this is not her first book published. She traveled a lot to visit the sites and interview the experts whether they were Federal employees or members of Tribes living amongst these tall timbers.

[Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this as part of my Book Bingo this year, in the PNW Nature category, and I'm really glad to have found it. Lynda Mapes worked at the Seattle Times for almost three decades, reporting on nature, natural history, Native cultures and governments, and PNW environmental news. This gives you an idea of the depth and breadth of her knowledge. By covering the PNW coast (from BC down to Oregon) as well as the northern East coast, Mapes reveals how these ecological challenges span the country. She looks at the history of these often centuries-old forests, and the impact of logging and plundering their abundance for the sake of "progress" and instant gratification.

What is harder to capture about her work with just the knowledge of her resume is how her writing is so moving and emotional. Her superb sense of storytelling was not a surprise, but having not read any of her work previously, I was not expecting it to often read more like poetry, an ode to the natural world and the life it has grown and sustained. I wrote while I was reading, "slow life core" and while that's obviously not the intended focus of the book, it was a background element that shone brightly for me. Here's a sample I highlighted on page 8: "In a world in which I so often wince and plug my ears and rush past noise, I was aware of how different--and delicious--it was to slow, to be as still as I could, to linger, giving all my attention to listening. I felt a soft swell of something I had not felt in some time: wonder."

I felt reading this the way I often feel when standing still and quiet in the middle of a hike in Washington As a deep, almost spiritual lover of trees and as an appreciator of profoundly-felt nature narratives, this one was a big win for me.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed reading this book. When I was trying to figure out what I might want to major in and where to attend college I thought maybe forestry, but ended up just studying biology. I love that researchers such as Ms Mapes are working with indigenous people all over the US to learn their knowledge and incorporate with science. Parts of this book were very sad concerning what's happened to our US environment in many places due to "progress", but encouraging to read about progress being made.

[Ben Goldfarb · Rating 5 out of 5]

Had a chance to blurb this book for UW Press; here's what I wrote:

The Northwest’s salmon forests are among this planet’s most complex and sacred ecosystems, and few writers understand them better than Linda Mapes. With a scientist’s care and a poet’s sense of wonder, Mapes artfully weaves the story of our continent’s glorious, imperiled old-growth trees — and the countless organisms, from herring to humans, whose futures depend upon their survival.

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poetic and powerful, realistic and hopeful, Mapes gives readers an intimate and global view of forests and their interconnectedness with other elements of nature, including us. Even though she delves into the historical and current challenges facing forests, she also details the recent progress made and encourages us, showing how we can make the hopeful possibility become a reality.

[Corah Whipple · Rating 5 out of 5]

listen to the trees!

[Bethany · Rating 5 out of 5]

Everyone should read. Take your time with it. Let each chapter sit with you.

[Lexus Pattershall · Rating 5 out of 5]

Love love love.