Around the World in 80 Trees

by Jonathan Drori

Trees are one of humanity's most constant and most varied companions. From India's sacred banyan tree to the fragrant cedar of Lebanon, they offer us sanctuary and inspiration—not to mention the raw materials for everything from aspirin to maple syrup.

In Around the World in 80 Trees, expert Jonathan Drori uses plant science to illuminate how trees play a role in every part of human life, from the romantic to the regrettable. Stops on the trip include the lime trees of Berlin's Unter den Linden boulevard, which intoxicate amorous Germans and hungry bees alike, the swankiest streets in nineteenth-century London, which were paved with Australian eucalyptus wood, and the redwood forests of California, where the secret to the trees' soaring heights can be found in the properties of the tiniest drops of water.

Each of these strange and true tales—populated by self-mummifying monks, tree-climbing goats and ever-so-slightly radioactive nuts—is illustrated by Lucille Clerc, taking the reader on a journey that is as informative as it is beautiful.

Genres: Nonfiction, Nature, Science, Environment, History, Travel, Biology

240 pages, Paperback

First published May 28, 2018

About the author

Jonathan Drori is a Trustee of The Eden Project,
an Ambassador for the WWF and was for nine
years a Trustee of the Royal Botanic Gardens,
Kew and The Woodland Trust. He is a Fellow of
the Linnean Society and the Zoological Society
of London, and a Member of the Institution
of Engineering and Technology. He is a former
Head of Commissioning for BBC Online and
Executive Producer of more than fifty primetime
BBC TV series on science and technology.
In 2006 he was awarded a CBE.

Reviews

[Pam · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jonathan Drori circles the globe for 80 specimens (of at least 60,000 species found in the world). He travels eastward from his native Britain and conveniently for me ends in the Americas among trees I’m most familiar with. I was excited that he covered two trees I’ve always had questions about. Why are there “knees” on bald cypresses and why do Aspens quake? He suggests possible answers but it turns out there is no scientific consensus. I’m satisfied with that.

Drori is a very good educator. In a simple book he gives excellent short descriptions on some complicated science and is not boring to someone who has read more than a few tree books. Environmental connectivity, the importance of diversity, and human connection to trees are some of his primary topics. There are many interesting facts to be learned here. For instance, the world’s tallest living tree is a redwood in California called Hyperion, standing at 389 feet tall (115 meters). It is about at its limit no matter how much longer it lives. Drori explains how water is drawn up the tree using energy of the sun, relying on connected water molecules to draw and push water from bottom to top. Because of physics and gravity there is a theoretical limit to how high water and nutrients can be lifted. If any tree pushes higher than 120 meters gravity will overcome its ability to get nourishment to the tree top. Hyperion is almost at its limit. I love this stuff.

To top it all off, so to speak, the illustrations of Lucille Clere are fantastic. Highly recommended.

[Spencer Orey · Rating 5 out of 5]

Awful title. Questionable cover. Gorgeous book!

I'm a complete sucker for books with beautiful nature illustrations like this one, and it's a special treat when the writing can keep up with the pictures.

Each of the 80 trees gets a page or two of thoughtful text full of origin stories, historical uses or cases, and reflections from expeditions around the world. Those stories are lined with beautiful illustrations of leaves, nuts, fruits, flowers, and sometimes whole trees. I'm inspired to learn more about trees and to draw. This is great.

[Melissa ♥ Dog/Wolf Lover ♥ Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful book! I love the art and I love all of the info. Here’s a few













Mel 🖤🐶🐺🐾

[Terri · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Keep a green tree in your heart and perhaps a singing bird will come.”
— Chinese proverb

I am a fan of author Jonathon Drori's "Ted Talks" on nature so I had to read his book. The author grew up near the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew learned to appreciate botany from his father who insisted on weekly excursions to the garden. This is a man who appreciates both the science and beauty of nature and it is reflected in his beautiful book.

Taking the name from Jules Verne's “Around the World in Eighty Days,” he started in London and traveled the globe in search of trees that either he appreciated or searched for trees that he always wanted to see. Sharing with the reader, his love of the diversity of trees was such a treat and I appreciated the education that was accompanied by the glorious illustrations. I had no idea how many uses that trees have provided for mankind including one tree in South America whose bark helps cure malaria.

I highly recommend the book in part for the detailed botanical illustrations which really helps the reader identify both the leaves, bark, seeds and pods of the various trees. This reader can't wait for Mr. Drori's next book. Five stars.

[Sud666 · Rating 5 out of 5]

A colleague of mine, in the Dendrology (the study of wooded plants) Department, knowing that I live in the middle of a nature preserve and my inclination to wander through nature recommended this book. I am glad he did.

Jonathan Drori goes around the world and highlights the wonderful trees from that region. Each description, superbly written and engaging, is filled with gorgeous illustrations by Lucille Clere. The vignettes not only are full of information about the plant but also highlights the history of the plant and how it interacts with the culture.

Take for example the Leyland Cypress. It is of the Cypress x leylandii classification. It is a uniquely English tree. Not only do you learn that it is resistant to salt spray and grows up to 3 feet per year. You will also find that, in England, where the height of man-made fences is 6.5 feet many English prefer to plant these trees instead which can grow up to 115 feet.

Do you like trees? Are you interested in a fascinating book, well written, engaging and beautifully illustrated? Then look no further and get this brilliant book. A great addition to my collection.

[Trish · Rating 5 out of 5]

tree: a plant that has a tall, woody stem
it can support itself and lasts from year to year

In a way, trees have helped shape the history of humankind.
Once upon a time, we sat and hid in trees. Later, we used their branches to carry, light and let burn fires. Then, we built our houses from their wood. To this day, we use them for shade as much as for a place to play in, we eat their fruit/seeds, decorate our living spaces with their branches, and even use them as a source for medicine and other materials vital to our way of life.

This book pays tribute to just how important trees are (or should be) to every human on the planet. It does so by telling us of 80 of the most well-known / "important" trees on the plant. I used quotation marks because how important a tree is is often subjective. Technically, they all are. But we're talking about 80 very specific ones here.

The author takes us on a tour through the world, thus dividing the book into the following 11 chapters:
- Northern Europe
- Southern Europe and North Africa
- Eastern Mediterranean
- Africa
- Central and South Asia
- East Asia
- South East Asia
- Oceania
- South America
- Mexico, Central America and Caribbean
- North America

Each entry / tree gets its very own and gorgeously detailed illustration of the whole tree as well as some details like the fruit or seeds or bark, what the tree is known / used for and animals living in / near it or famous structures where such trees grow nearby. Here are some of my favourite illustrations:









The writing style is fast-paced (believe it or not), very accessible and just the right amount of funny to adequately tell the reader about these fascinating life forms. Of course, it helps that the author doesn't simply rattle off facts but intersperses each portrait with anecdotes ranging from the hilarious to the tragic. It's a nice way of showing just how close humans are to trees and always have been - something we shouldn't forget because without trees, we're screwed, and we're not really paying enough attention to that fact.

As a person who was born in an area that was smack in the middle of what once was THE forest in the world (apart from the Amazonian rainforest) but which is now only a sad little remnant of itself, I was bound to love this book. I mean, I'm no Waldschrat, but I know first-hand how much impact a forest ( and therefore each individual tree) has on the life of other plants, animals and also humans. And if having been born in a forest that is featured in many a fairy tale isn't enough, consider this: I prefer taking hundreds of pictures of treees that have grown hilariously crooked or in the weirdest places instead of taking pictures of people (let alone myself). So yeah, when I say I love trees, I mean LOVE them.

A wonderful book to read cover-to-cover or to look up a specific tree if you know its name (English or Latin) or to check what grows where and what makes the respective tree extraordinary or even iconic.

[Elyse✨ · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful book. I spent just as much time looking at the illustrations as reading the text. They are drawings rather than photographs and each is a detailed work of art. The writing is witty, whimsical and informative. The author picked both esoteric and common species to describe. Definitely one of those "Who knew?" kind of books. I love trees and this book too.

[Literary Redhead · Rating 5 out of 5]

🌳 🌳 🌳 🌳 🌳

What a stunning ode to nature, told through the most beautiful illustrations and stories that make the world come alive! The author reveals the secret of trees ... from lime trees that line Berlin's Unter den Linden boulevard to sacred Banyan trees in India, California’s storied redwoods, and London’s eucalyptus-paved avenues. Plus tree-climbing goats, radioactive nuts, self-mummifying monks. It’s a weird wonderful travelogue for outdoor enthusiasts and lovers of well-told tales! 5/5

Pub Date 28 May 2018.

Thanks to the author, Laurence King Publishing Ltd. and NetGalley for the review copy. Opinions are mine.

#80trees #NetGalley

[David Wineberg · Rating 5 out of 5]

Trees are gifts. Just figure out what their special features are, and you can keep the gifts coming. The gifts can be as simple as shade, as complex as medicine, as practical as boards and posts or as supportive as fruits and nuts. And that’s just for humans. In Around the World in 80 Trees, Jonathan Drori demonstrates a true passion and appreciation of those gifts, as he describes 80 of them by geographical region. He describes the, what’s unique about how they work and stories of how they fit in.

The text is accompanied by exquisite color drawings by Lucille Clerc which are far superior to photographs. They highlight what Drori writes about in closeups of seeds or fruits in various stages, roots, canopies or trunks. For boxwoods, there is a complex French garden. For alders, there is Venice. Drori uses both sides of the page, differently for every tree, giving the layout nice variety.

There are trees so dense they sink rather than float, trees that only grow in saltwater-soaking sands, and trees that hold their seeds tightly sealed in wax until there is a forest fire below them. One tree holds its seeds in pods that explode with such violence the seeds fly off at 150 mph (the sandbox, Costa Rica).

Some to remember:

Linden trees are limes. Aphids live in them and drop honeydew on the ground – or on parked cars, leaving that famous sticky mess. It’s not the tree’s doing. Bees get drunk on the blossoms, and can often be seen stumbling around on the ground beneath them. People don’t act quite as badly, but are still smitten (with each other) in spring by the fragrance of the blossoms.

The argan of the Mediterranean has a fruit so tempting to goats that they climb up the trees and out onto the branches to get at it. The oil from it is used in creams, cosmetics and cooking, giving employment to about three million – people.

Nordic spruce grows so slowly its rings are tiny, giving the wood great strength while remaining light. That is why they are used in violins, cellos and basses (notably Stradivarius). Their solidity produces the best vibrations, aka sound. The wood is so dense it takes 10-50 years for the wood to dry. The longer you can wait, the better the sound will be.

Alder is waterproof when totally submerged. Venice is built on it: thousands of poles, carved to a point and driven into the mud. Its charcoal makes the best gunpowder, sending balls faster harder and farther. It even burns hotter, enabling ironworks.

Beech trees can survive lightning strikes because water runs down their smooth bark onto the ground. Unusually, the bark expands as the tree grows, keeping the surface smooth. On most other trees, the bark splits as the tree grows, allowing water and insects to invade the interior.

Coco-de-Mer is native to the Seychelles only. Its coconut weighs 65 pounds, the heaviest seed there is. Imagine a bag of cement falling from the top of a tree. After it rots, the seed sends out roots 15 feet away so as not to interfere with the mother tree.

The gutta-percha tree of Borneo turned out to have latex inside the trunk and the leaves that could be a sealant. Werner von Siemens invented a process to coat transoceanic cables with it and prevent the salt water from destroying the copper wires inside. He produced a quarter million miles of cable for telegraph systems.

Mangrove trees are unique in that their seeds germinate and grow roots while still growing on the tree. They fall like darts and anchor themselves in the sand, firmly enough to withstand tides. The tree is a desalination plant, purifying the salt water as it is sucked up towards the leaves by the sun evaporating moisture from them. They can live only in the narrow band of territory between the mean sea level and high tide, and so are threatened by rising seas.

The giant redwoods of California grow to what turns out to be theoretical maximum height for trees – 400 feet. Any taller and gravity would overtake water’s cohesion properties and the crown of the tree would dry up, killing the tree.

You can read Around the World in 80 Trees as a reference book, looking up trees you’ve heard about or what is native to different countries. Or, you can read it as a regular book, and the astounding variety of strategies that plants took on fairly jump off the page. From having pollinators tunnel through fruit to spikes and spines and various poisons in the bark and leaves, trees are far more varied beings than we give them credit for.

One word of advice, do not get the Kindle version. The few drawings that made into that format have been reduced to thumbnails to fit the small screen. You miss fully half the book. Stick to paper – a gift from trees.

David Wineberg

[Tuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

nice reading, wonderful illustrations. author highlights various trees in 2-3 pages with some description, history, and fun facts. usually in a light hearted and sometimes jokey way (considering people have decimated many of these species and their habitats, which author does mention). his annotated short bibliography is worth picking up book. has index too.
some of the trees: lime, tanoak, peepul, Western hemlock, Brazil nut, betel, Brazil wood, mangrove.....

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I would never have believed that a book on trees could be this thrilling! Jonathan Drori writes in a way that captured me instantly and the illustrations by Lucille Clere are exquisite. Rather than write on my impression of all 80 trees, I will mention only a few of my favorites in this review.

Jonathan Drori's dry wit is evidenced by his comments about the London Plane tree’s parentage – “the American sycamore and the Oriental plane” - “Introduced by plant-hunters, the two trees probably met and mingled towards the end of the seventeenth century, although there is debate about whether this was in England, Spain or – quelle horreur! – France.”

Leylandii, which is the “monster offspring” of two trees – the hardy yellow cedar from Oregon and the Monterey cypress – was commonly used to provide privacy screening between neighbors in England – it was loved by some and hated by others who felt that it blocked out their light. “The media loved publishing stories of feuding neighbors coming to fisticuffs over lost light. Hedge strife caused a suicide and at least two murders.”

I’ve long loved silver birches and was surprised to learn that it is the National Tree of Finland. “By day, the distinctive monochrome pattern of snow-clad birch forests is dazzling and disorientating, but during long boreal nights, their moonlit, ghostly forms take on an eerie power. Birches abound in the folk tales of northern peoples and many superstitions and rituals surround the tree.”

“In Kiev [Ukraine], an early nineteenth-century craze for planting horse chestnuts never abated, and tourist brochures rightly boast that there is nowhere better to enjoy them.”

As a girl, I enjoyed playing ‘conkers’ with the chestnut-nut brown seeds of the horse chestnut tree.

“During World War II, Anne Frank could see a horse chestnut from a window in the Amsterdam attic where she lived in hiding.” She wrote about the tree in her diary, describing it in winter and how it inspired her to look forward to spring.

“It is no exaggeration to say that the magnificent cedar of Lebanon played a critical role in the development of civilization.”

“We know, from core samples of soil and the pollen they contain, that 10,000 years ago vast cedar forests stretched across the easter Mediterranean towards Mesopotamia and what is now southwestern Iran.” I saw a magnificent domed cedar of Lebanon tree recently at Hidcote Manor Garden, the broad canopy was amazing – it truly is a majestic tree.

“Now the national tree of Chile,” I’ve seen several monkey puzzle trees in England, most recently up in Lancashire. They are truly different. Drori writes, “the tree has a reptilian demeanor. Groups of branches grow from single points on the trunk, curling and dividing like pipe-cleaners. Glossy dark-green leaves, paler at the branches’ growing tips, are exceedingly sharp, arranged spirally and so densely as to clothe each branch completely.”

Breadfruit – “the botanical characteristics of the tree, which is now cultivated throughout the humid tropics, arguably led to the most notorious mutiny of all time.” while they waited the six-months it took for roots to grow on the cuttings from the breadfruit plants, Captain Robert Bligh’s crew grew used to island life and formed bonds with the locals. The idea was for them to transport these cuttings “from Tahiti to the Caribbean,” however, the crew didn’t want to leave the island, “they mutinied just after setting sail, casting Bligh adrift with his few loyal men. Against the odds, he survived […] and, in 1793, arrived in Jamaica with several hundred little breadfruit trees.”

“Native to the foggy hills of the Pacific North West, the colossal coastal redwoods are the world’s highest trees, and among its oldest.” I am very fortunate to have been able to travel to see them in California and was truly surprised to find some growing at Queenswood Arboretum in Herefordshire, England!

“The black walnut is a stately native of the United States east of the Rocky Mountains.”
Fascinating fact - “During World War I, black walnut was specified for aircraft propellers because it could withstand huge forces without fragmenting.”

[Rosey Mucklestone · Rating 5 out of 5]

shoutout to my family for putting up with the endless barrage of tree facts this book instigated

[Moira Macfarlane · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wát zijn de bomen op onze aardbol geweldig! Sommige bevatten complete ecosystemen of maken onderdeel uit van de cultuur op de plek waar ze groeien. Drori neemt je mee de wereld rond via 80 bomen, 80 bijzondere verhalen over hoe ze groeien, bloeien, vrucht dragen, maar ook hun rol in hun omgeving voor zowel mens als dier. En dan die meer dan prachtige illustraties bij elke boom door Licille Clerc 🌳

Eén ding stemde wel intens treurig, want in veel van die mooie verhalen bleek ook hoeveel wij als mensheid al aan bomen en bos om zeep hebben geholpen, ik stond er versteld van hóe veel, echt schrikbarend.

'Een van mijn vroegste herinneringen betreft een enorme libanonceder vlak bij ons huis. Op een winterochtend ontdekten we dat hij dood was, zijn stam en takken lagen verspreid en werden in stukken gezaagd. Dat was de eerste keer dat ik mijn vader zag huilen. Ik dacht aan het mooie gevaarte van honderden jaren oud waarvan ik had gedacht dat hij onoverwinnelijke was, maar dat was hij niet, en aan mijn vader, van wie ik had gedacht dat hij altijd alles onder controle had, maar dat had hij niet. Mijn moeder zei dat er een hele wereld in die boom had gezeten. Ik weet nog dat ik daar diep over nadacht.'

Voor een inkijkje: https://www.instagram.com/p/CGJxcOHgzn2/

[Clare O'Beara · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book of a jaunt around the world, looking at trees on the way. The author, who grew up wandering Kew Gardens, looks at British Isles trees first, with the rowan for Scotland and Arbutus for Ireland. Off to Finland to meet the birch, wandering through cork oak forests and larches across the continent, before encountering the exotic and valuable timbers, spices, barks and resins of the fabled Orient, bloated looking baobabs of Africa, toxic trees of nutrient-poor countries, lightweight timber, timber too heavy to float, trees with knees, trees with giant seeds, trees with animals spreading their seeds, trees that stop disastrous illness, trees used for main masts. And at the end you will still be saying, "But what about...." because only 80 trees are included.

The pages are copiously illustrated, making the book a joy for any tree lover, a feast for the eyes. And not only have we learned about the trees, we learnt about the industry, population or animals that share their lives and fortunes, including pollinators, traders, cooks and aeroplane makers. As the countries are so scattered, and best of new science applied, even longtime tree lovers like me will learn something.

I downloaded an ARC from Net Galley. This is an unbiased review.

[J.M. Hushour · Rating 5 out of 5]

Trees are Nature's exclamation points! I love trees, and if you love trees you can't go further than this book to learn about some wacky variants you've never heard of, and facts about familiar forest friends. Starting in the UK, Drori accompanied by the wonderful tree art of Lucille Clerc, goes east around the world, serving up a hefty dollop of fact and natural history in about as succinct as you can, highly readable, often funny and never longer than two pages. A beautiful and instructive book that just goes to show you we should respect our goddamn planet way more than we do.

[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 5 out of 5]

You know trees are alive. But do you think of them as living beings? With individuality? And needs?

You will after reading this book.

Author Jonathan Drori, an Ambassador for the WWF and Trustee of the Eden Project, accompanied by illustrator Lucille Clere, takes us on a trip through trees around the world. He visits with trees I know well, like the Elm and the Lodgepole Pine and the Baobob and the Date Palm, but he adds stories and details about the familiar that are surprising and unexpected. He also makes stops with trees I knew little about including the Brazil Nut and the Neem and the Coco-de-mer and makes me add these to my list of favorite trees. Drori is a former documentary film maker for the BBC. I hope someone will make this into a documentary.

I know that not everyone is as enamored of trees as I am (yes, I even have a Goodreads tag of trees), but even if you don't think you are, you still might enjoy this book; I can't imagine anyone who wouldn't.

#2020ReadNonFic

[~☆~Autumn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Endless fascinating facts about trees that I never knew. "The largest wooded region on the planet is the boreal coniferous forest, which dwarfs the tropical rainforests and accounts for about a third of the Earth's total forest cover. It blankets a swathe around the Arctic Circle, across Alaska and northern Canada. It covers nearly 7.8 million square kilometers (3 million square miles) of Siberia alone, where it is known as the taiga......... This is the realma of the larch."

[Joanna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a gorgeous book. I love the title, the cover, the organization, and the spirit of it. We meander (well, I meander, anyway- it took me more than two years to make my way from cover to cover!) around the world, with a delightful biography of a spectacular tree known in each region. We get a bit of natural history, botanical illustration, and some key facts about each tree. The style is gentle, but implacable in warning us that we must protect these incredible specimens. I really enjoyed savoring this book by reading a tree or two once in awhile from March 2019 to July 2021!

[Denver Public Library · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the introduction to Jonathan Drori’s tree world tour he tells an anecdote from his childhood about a “spectacular cedar of Lebanon” near his family home that they find dead one winter, being cut down after a lighting strike. He shares with the reader that this was the first time he saw his father cry – “I thought about the huge, heavy, beautiful thing that was hundreds of years old and that I had thought invincible, and wasn’t, and my father, who I had thought would always be in benign control of everything, and wasn’t.” I learned about many things in this book–goats who climb the Argan trees in Morocco, neighbor feuds over light-blocking Leyland Cypress, the process of harvesting Cork for wine stoppers in Portugal–Drori clearly knows his trees. The author profiles 80 trees from around the world, covering mythic, political, cultural history along with the biology and ecology of each specimen. But it is the care, vulnerability, and love demonstrated in the story from his boyhood, and woven through each tree portrait, that made this book for me (along with the wonderful illustrations by Lucille Clerc). I look forward to meeting trees in my own life with the same level of care.

[Shauna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an excellent book. Perfect mix of biology, history and anecdotes.

[Ugnė · Rating 5 out of 5]

Imdama šią knygą iš bibliotekos nustebau, kad ji priklauso abonementui, o ne meno skyriui. Ir toliau stebiuosi, nes man atrodo, kad jos vieta ten - iliustracijos yra nuostabios ir vien dėl jų ši knyga man prilygo meno albumui. Tekstas irgi nuostabus - paprastas, suprantamas, žaismingas, su istorija ir liūdesiu, kad dauguma aprašomų medžių yra atsidūrę ties išnykimo riba.

[Max · Rating 4 out of 5]

A beautiful book for tree lovers. Great illustrations and I love the author's stories. I really learned some new things about my favourite trees!

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for an ARC to read.

[Anne-Marie · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an absolutely lovely comforting read! It was full of fun facts and gorgeous artwork (seriously, I want some of these pieces on my walls).

The author selected 80 trees from around the world, moving from Europe through the Mediterranean to Africa, Asia, Oceania, and into the Americas (broken down further than that).
Some of the trees were known to me and many were delightful surprises. I learned a lot of interesting tidbits about their history, physiology, and uses to humans - from Indigenous cultures, ancient and more modern civilizations in the Mediterranean and Middle East, and European colonizers and modern capitalists.

Considering the short length of each tree's story (1-2 pages), I think he balanced the wonderful art and interesting evolutionary quirks of these trees alongside the important reminders of over-exploitation, capitalism, climate change, and destruction of ecosystems for profit and industrialization. By the end, I was deeply sympathetic to the traumas these trees have gone through (and the cultures - many Indigenous - who were traumatized alongside their environments) and enraged by how humans can be so shortsighted and focused on trees as a resource rather than a living being.

I highly recommend if you want to dip in and out of this book - it's worth your time, in my opinion and very accessible.
Also, a great chance to practice out your best David Attenborough impression in narrating these stories!

[Niranjan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book . True to it's name, this book takes you on a journey with different trees around the world . There's a nice story about each tree , some of it's characteristics, how it evolved , how it might have been involved in different historic events . There's also some mythology references and word root associations which were fun to read .

[Claudia · Rating 3 out of 5]

No matter where on this planet you live, some of these trees will be familiar as the one standing outside their home or passing by on the way to school, work or just for a pleasant walk. Others may be familiar names and maybe seen in photographs but never seen in person while even more are newly introduced as exotic and strange. Thousands of tree species and the author was forced to choose only 80. And such choices he made -

Like - - the cork oak which has it's bark harvested about every decade, turning the underwood a rick dark red and the cork itself providing enough thermal insulation to shield the space shuttles fuel tanks. And of course, as stoppers for various drinks.
*The white mulberry which is so essential to the silk industry.
*The Siberian and Dahurian larch trees which survive bitter cold winters and hot summers.
*The towering coastal redwoods.
*Banyan trees with the largest crown which enables the tree - through the planting of aerial roots - to expand outwards. A single tree that could actually cover acres beneath it's branches.
*The coco-de-mer with its 65-pound seeds that germinate and grow sideways to get away from the parent tree.
And that's only 6. There are avocados and cashews, elms, and oaks and monkey puzzle trees. Breadfruit and kauri. The traveller's tree with its spreading fan-like crown. Areca palm and baobab and brazil nut and brazilwood (not the same) and dragon blood with its brilliant red sap. Frankincense resin and wild apples. And even more.

Descriptions of the tree itself, the leaves, the flowers and some other interesting items of note for each example. Two to four pages - mostly lovely colored pencil-like illustrations - for each entry. Unfortunately, many are endangered not only by human demands on what these trees can provide as well as climate change and environmental devastation.

2023-022

[Jeff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dope. Just go read it.

--------- UPDATE ----------

I just finished re-reading this book. So interesting, I'll probably continue to revisit it until I've memorized its contents on my death bed. It actually inspired me to order some yaupon tea. Who knows, if I enjoy it, maybe I'll grow a stand of yaupon holly to make my own.

Anyway, still dope. Go read it.

[Mauricio Montenegro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Este es un libro maravilloso que fácilmente podría etiquetarse como de difusión científica pero que trasciende el género. Cada entrada, bellamente ilustrada por Lucille Lecrerc, revela no solo un árbol más, sino un mundo entero. La generosa relación de datos históricos, botánicos, biológicos, geográficos, literarios o religiosos es el paraíso de un ñoño. Con gracia y erudición, Drori nos hace conscientes de la densidad de nuestra relación con los árboles, con los que hemos convivido por al menos cinco mil años documentados y que han sido nuestra sombra, templo, farmacia, fábrica, hogar. Han sido el origen de perfumes, aceites, jugos, comidas, drogas, insecticidas. Hemos usado su madera para todo tipo de propósitos, pero también las cortezas, las flores, los frutos, las resinas, las semillas, los tallos, los gusanos, los hongos, las hojas (molidas, quemadas, enterradas, escupidas por otros animales...) La exuberancia de las opciones es tan embriagadora como el libro mismo.

[Anita · Rating 5 out of 5]

Around the World in 80 Trees is a beautifully illustrated and well written guide to the world’s trees. It includes quirky anecdotes, scientific lessons, and local history related to trees around the planet. The illustrations made me grab this book from Hatcher library, and I ended up reading and rereading it out of order throughout the year. There is so much to learn about each tree from where different birds nest in the branches to how different cultures make use of the wood. I learned so much and enjoyed having this lovely guide around to flip through. Definitely planning to borrow or buy Around the World in 80 Birds next. 🌳

[Nina · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautifully illustrated and providing a survey around the world - from Europe to Africa over to Asia, Oceania, Australia and New Zealand, over to the Americas. Each chapter provides a short description of the tree and its characteristics, each with stories about what makes this kind of tree special.
In the back there is a comprehensive list of book recommendations for those who want to learn more, and this has already significantly extended my want-to-read.

[Ingrid · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a fantastic book about some of the more important or iconic tree species around the world. It is more of a reference and discusses each tree separately so I took my time to read it. The illustrations are excellent and I learned a lot of history of many trees that I thought I knew a lot about.

This would be a perfect coffee table gift for anyone who is interested in ethnobotany or trees in general.