Introduction: The Tree as a Measure of Our Future

Trees are phenomenal living beings. They constitute the majority of the Earth’s terrestrial biomass, yet their importance to life and to the biosphere as a whole is still widely underestimated. Forests are often described as the lungs of the planet, producing the oxygen we breathe while absorbing harmful pollutants such as carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide, and nitrogen dioxide. But trees do far more than regulate atmospheric chemistry. They stabilise soil, moderate climate, store water, support biodiversity, and anchor cultural meaning across time.

In the twenty-first century, trees stand at the centre of intersecting ecological, cultural, and ethical crises. Climate change, deforestation, biodiversity loss, and social disconnection are not separate phenomena; they are symptoms of a worldview that treats the natural world as inert, expendable, and external to human life. How we perceive trees directly influences how we treat them: and how we treat them, in turn, shapes the future of the planet.

This editorial argues that protecting trees requires more than policy and science alone. It requires a transformation of perception and values. Drawing on ecology, climate science, cultural history, and participatory eco-art practice, I suggest that tree veneration, understood not as nostalgia but as relational ethics, offers a powerful framework for pro-environmental behaviour. The Tree Veneration Society (TVS), founded in 2011, exists as one such response: an interdisciplinary collective of eco-artists and scientists committed to honouring trees as essential partners in planetary survival. TVS’s praxis demonstrates that interdisciplinarity, or joining ecology with art, ritual, and community participation, can create experiences that generate both action and hope in the face of ecological crisis.

Fig 1. The Tree Veneration Society

https://treevenerationsociety.com

Trees and the Living Earth

Fig 2. The Tarkine Old Growth Forest, Tasmania, Australia. Photograph: Louise Fowler-Smith

Trees are integral to every major life-support system on Earth. They absorb and store carbon in their wood, roots, and leaves; up to 22 tonnes over a tree’s lifetime, making forests one of the planet’s most effective natural carbon sinks. Since 2000, forests have absorbed an estimated average of two billion metric tonnes of carbon annually, significantly slowing the acceleration of climate change.[1]

Trees also function as vast hydrological systems. They can be understood as a living water column, lifting and transpiring enormous quantities of water into the atmosphere.[2] In rainforests such as the Amazon, a single tree may transpire hundreds of litres of water per day, generating mist that travels long distances before condensing into rain. Forests continually replenish planetary water cycles; when they are destroyed, rainfall patterns are destabilised, springs dry up, and ecosystems collapse.

Beneath the soil, trees perform equally complex work. Their roots loosen and stabilise the ground, prevent erosion, reduce runoff after storms, and create reservoirs of water and nutrients shared with surrounding plants. Leaf litter enriches soil, while decomposing organic matter contributes to river and marine ecosystems. In Japan, marine chemist Katsuhiko Matsunaga demonstrated that humic acid from decomposing leaves fertilises plankton, supporting entire marine food chains, a discovery that inspired coastal reforestation campaigns known as Forests are the Lovers of the Sea.[3]

Trees also regulate temperature. During the day, a tree’s interior remains cooler than the surrounding air; at night, it retains warmth. This moderates soil temperature, reduces urban heat, and creates microclimates essential for life. In cities, trees lower energy consumption by shading buildings, reduce noise and air pollution, and improve mental wellbeing. Even birdsong, made possible by urban canopy, has been shown to enhance community health.

The Intelligence and Cooperation of Trees

Fig 3. Ancient Fig Tree, Queensland. Photograph: Louise Fowler-Smith

Scientifically, trees are among the most ingenious life forms on Earth. Their internal systems, the xylem and phloem, transport water, minerals, and sugars across vast vertical distances, sometimes exceeding 100 metres. Despite centuries of study, scientists are still refining their understanding of how trees lift water against gravity with such efficiency.[4]

Trees are also capable of self-healing. When infected, they compartmentalise disease using lignin, a strong polymer that isolates damaged tissue. Their leaves regulate gas exchange through stomata, up to 100,000 per square centimetre in species such as oak, controlling the intake of carbon dioxide and the release of oxygen and water vapour.

More remarkably still, trees are social beings. Through mycorrhizal fungi, first identified in the nineteenth century and now understood to underpin most terrestrial ecosystems, trees exchange nutrients, water, and information.[5] This underground network, often referred to as the “Wood Wide Web,” allows trees to support sick neighbours, warn each other of pests, and collectively regulate forest health. Research by Suzanne Simard has shown that trees communicate through electrical signals and chemical cues, redistributing resources in ways that enhance the resilience of the entire forest.[6]

As Peter Wohlleben argues, forests function not as collections of individuals, but as communities.[7] Old trees nurse young ones, stumps of felled trees are kept alive for centuries, and diversity strengthens resilience. Cooperation, not competition, has enabled trees to become the dominant life form on Earth for over 300 million years.

Climate Change, Deforestation, and the Future of Forests

Fig 4. Photograph of old growth forest in the Tarkine, Tasmania and photograph from nearby woodchip factory in Burnie, Tasmania, Australia. Photograph: Louise Fowler-Smith

Despite their importance, forests are being destroyed at an alarming rate. Since 1990, the planet has lost approximately 420 million hectares of forest.[8] Between 46,000 and 58,000 square miles of forest are cleared each year, and much of this destruction is driven by land conversion for agriculture, timber extraction, and short-term capital gain.

Over the past 8,000 years, humanity has eliminated roughly half of the world’s original forests. Scientists estimate that since 1850, around 30 per cent of all carbon emissions have resulted from deforestation. Forest clearance contributes not only to carbon emissions but to biodiversity loss, soil degradation, and disrupted hydrological cycles. As forests disappear, so too do the cultures, medicines, and systems of knowledge that have co-evolved with them over millennia.

The consequences are accelerating. According to the IPCC, human-induced climate change is already intensifying heatwaves, droughts, floods, and cyclones in every region of the world.[9] Atmospheric CO₂ levels are now the highest they have been in at least 750,000 years. Warming beyond 1.5°C, expected within this decade, will result in irreversible damage to ecosystems and human communities.

Forests themselves are becoming victims of climate change. Warmer winters have allowed bark beetle populations to explode, devastating forests in North America. Fungal diseases are killing ash trees across Britain. Ancient bristlecone pines, some over 4,000 years old, are now at risk. Alarmingly, scientists acknowledge that forests remain poorly studied relative to their importance.

Tasmania, Australia: Ancient Forests, Modern Threats

In Tasmania, some of the world’s most extraordinary forests still remain, though they are rapidly diminishing. Huon Pine, King Billy Pine, Pencil Pine, and deciduous beech form ancient stands that have persisted for millennia. CSIRO-led research in the 1980s revealed Huon Pines dating back over 3,000 years, with dead logs exceeding 38,000 years in age.[10]

Tasmania is also home to Eucalyptus regnans, the world’s tallest flowering plant. Once covering nearly 100,000 hectares, fewer than 5,000 hectares of undisturbed old-growth forest remain protected today. These forests survive largely due to tireless campaigning by scientists and activists.

Fig 5. The Ancients by Louise Fowler-Smith

Research by Dr Jennifer Sanger and The Tree Projects has demonstrated that Tasmania’s old-growth forests are among the most carbon-dense on Earth.[11] Logging them, followed by slash burning and replanting, releases vast quantities of stored carbon while creating forests that hold only a fraction of the original carbon load. Forest ecologist David Lindenmayer has shown that logged forests burn more severely than intact ones, increasing fire risk in a warming climate.[12]

Trees and Human Well-Being

Trees are not only essential to planetary systems; they are essential to human health. Research consistently shows that contact with forests improves attention, memory, immune function, and psychological wellbeing.[13] In Japan, the practice of shinrin-yoku, or forest bathing, has been shown to reduce stress hormones and increase immune cells that fight disease.

Trees have long been central to medicine. From willow bark (the basis of aspirin) to taxanes derived from the Pacific yew, forest plants underpin modern pharmaceuticals. Conservation International estimates that at least 120 prescription drugs are derived from forest species.[14]

Culturally, trees pervade myth, ritual, cosmology, and community identity. Across time and geography, trees have been understood as sacred. Mircea Eliade identified the tree as axis mundi—a symbol connecting earthly and cosmic realms.[15] Across world traditions, from Norse myths to Indian sacred groves, trees are understood as cosmically central, relational, and sentient. These perceptions have tangible conservation outcomes: sacred trees and groves in India continue to be protected through ritual adornment and veneration, traditions that have demonstrably prevented logging.[16]

Fig 6. Kalpa vriksha tree for fertility and marriage, Arunachala, Tamil Nadu, India. Photograph:  Louise Fowler-Smith

Perception, Behaviour, and Environmental Engagement

How we perceive trees shapes how we act toward them. Deep psychological research suggests that cognitive “perceptual defence” can render the surroundings invisible or threatening, depending on personal and cultural framing. A farmer who describes a copse of trees as “vermin,” for instance, is operating from a worldview in which trees are obstacles rather than life-support systems.

Conversely, cultures that understand trees as sentient, sacred, or relational tend to afford them protection. In India, the ritual adornment of sacred trees transforms them symbolically and materially: decoration marks these trees as different from the everyday, worthy of reverence and care.[17] Where Forest veneration persists, it results in long-term conservation. If perception shapes behaviour, then addressing the ecological crisis must include cultural and aesthetic strategies that shift how people see themselves in relation to the living world.

Scientific communication research shows that information alone rarely motivates long-term behavioural change. Approaches rooted in fear or guilt often produce resistance. By contrast, collective engagement, shared meaning, and emotional connection foster sustained environmental concern. People are more likely to act when they feel part of a community working toward an ecological future, and when they feel a personal, affective connection to the living world.

Introducing the Tree Veneration Society (TVS): Art, Action, and Hope

In 2011 I founded the Tree Veneration Society, a transdisciplinary, contemporary eco-arts and science collective that seeks to expand human engagement with trees through creative participation. TVS operates from the premise that how we see the world shapes how we act in the world. If trees are seen as passive objects or mere commodities, they will be treated accordingly. If trees are seen as relational beings, essential companions in ecological life, humans may begin to act from care rather than extraction.

Our mission, as stated on the TVS website, is:

To inspire our audience to respect the natural world and commit to protecting it. We do this by offering sensorial experience with nature through our intergenerational workshops, combining environmental education with art, and our multidisciplinary exhibitions and events. Our collective commitment ensures we are a catalyst for change. We draw on the power of nature and art to transcend culture and language barriers, to pull diverse communities together, and facilitate inclusivity. We create space for reflection, conversation and action.

TVS emerged from a recognition that data alone, even incontrovertible scientific data, is insufficient to shift cultural values. People change behaviour when they feel connected, when they find meaning, and when they see themselves as participants in ecological life rather than detached observers

TVS activities include:

• Educational Symposiums that bring together scientists, philosophers, and artists to explore the biological, cultural, and ethical dimensions of trees.

• 

  Fig 7. TVS Symposium, Woollahra Gallery at Redleaf. 2023. Speakers included Louise Fowler-Smith; Professor Brett Summerell, Chief Scientist, Botanic Gardens of Sydney; Dr David Curtis, EcoArts Australis; and Ms Michelle Rose, Environmental Education Officer, Woollahra Council. Photograph: Miho Watanabe

• Eco-Art Exhibitions that reinterpret forests through sensory and relational frameworks.

• 

  Fig 8. “Sacred Grove in your Street’ Group Exhibition. Part of the ‘Canopy of Life’ Festival with Willoughby Council. 2024. Photograph: Louise Fowler-Smith

• Nature-Based Workshops that invite participants to listen to, draw, create or ceremonially honour individual trees.

• 

  Fig 9. Get to Know a Tree Via all the Senses: Listening, Seeing, Smelling, Tasting. Photograph: Louise Fowler-Smith

Fig 10. TVS Creating Wellbeing Nature Workshop. Photograph: Paula Broom

Fig 11. TVS Greenway Nature based textile Workshop, North Sydney. Photograph: Paula Broom

• Community Performances that blend storytelling, movement, and place-based rituals.

• 

  Fig 12. Tree Parade to promote the Significant Trees of the Blackburn Gardens, Woollahra. 2023. Photograph: Miho Watanabe

These activities are designed not simply to inform but to engage the affective, imaginative, and embodied dimensions of human experience.

Eco-Art, Deep Ecology, and Collective Imagination

Eco-art, broadly understood as art that engages ecological systems and social justice, challenges the separation between culture and nature. According to the EcoArt Network:

Ecological Art is an art practice that embraces an ethic of social justice in both its content and form or materials. EcoArt is created to inspire caring and respect, stimulate dialogue, and encourage the long-term flourishing of the social and natural environments in which we live.[18]

This definition resonates deeply with TVS. We view art not purely as decoration or illustration, but as an active mode of perception and engagement, something that can cultivate an emotional and ethical affinity with trees and land.

The philosophical foundation of TVS draws on Deep Ecology and the work of Joanna Macy, a scholar and activist whose teachings on ecological consciousness and collective grief have influenced environmental movements worldwide. Macy’s Work That Reconnects reframes ecological despair as a doorway to compassion, care, and collaborative action.

Art and collective ritual can facilitate what social scientists call “meaningful hope” — a kind of hope grounded in shared action rather than denial. Research shows that people who participate in collective environmental action are more likely to sustain engagement over time. Hope, in this model, is generated through action, not passive expectation.[19]

TVS embeds these philosophies in participatory practice. Our workshops and exhibitions are not passive displays but spaces of encounter, where participants confront their perceptions, deepen their sensory experience of trees and nature, and discover new ways of relating to the living world. Through art, ritual, and collective reflection, participants often describe a shift from separation to connection; a crucial step toward sustained environmental action.

Tree Veneration as Cultural Practice and Conservation Strategy

Tree veneration is not merely symbolic; in many cultures it functions as de facto conservation. In India, the adornment and protection of sacred trees transform them into beings set apart from commodity logic. This aesthetic and ritual enhancement creates a cultural norm of respect, care, and protection that has persisted for centuries.[20]

In contrast, extractive mindsets treat forests as stocks to be monetised, timber to be logged, or land to be cleared. Such approaches are epistemologically limited and ecologically destructive. Old forests store significantly more carbon than newly planted plantations; when ancient trees are felled, the carbon they have sequestered over centuries is released, and newly planted trees cannot plausibly replace their ecological function within human timescales.

Conclusion: Toward a Culture of Respect and Reciprocity

Trees have survived for hundreds of millions of years through adaptability, cooperation, and relational networks. They offer a model for human communities steeped in interdependence rather than domination.

The climate and biodiversity crisis is not only scientific or political. It is cultural, ethical, and perceptual. To address it requires expanding our sense of identity beyond human-centrism to a relational ecology that includes trees, forests, and the systems that sustain life.

The Tree Veneration Society offers one pathway into that relational understanding. By bringing together art, science, ritual, and community, TVS models an ecological ethic that is at once practical and profound. Through engagement with trees, not merely as data points or resources, but as living beings with whom we share this planet, we may yet reimagine our obligations, responsibilities, and futures.

To care for trees is, ultimately, to care for ourselves and the continuance of life on Earth.

Endnotes

1. Jerry Melillo, “Forests and Climate Change,” MIT Climate Portal, accessed January 6, 2022, https://climate.mit.edu/explainers/forests-and-climate-change.
2. Fred Hageneder, The Spirit of Trees: Science, Symbiosis and Inspiration (New York: Continuum, 2001), 27.
3. Katsuhiko Matsunaga, Japanese coastal reforestation studies.
4. David Suzuki and Wayne Grady, Tree: A Life Story (Vancouver: Greystone Books, 2018), 46.
5. Suzuki and Grady, Tree: A Life Story, 55.
6. Suzanne Simard, Mother Trees and the Social Forest. 2021.

7. Peter Wohlleben, The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How They Communicate. Discoveries from a Secret World (Carlton, Victoria: Black Inc., 2015),
8. Christina Nunez, “Deforestation Explained. Human-Driven and Natural Loss of Trees: Deforestation Affects Wildlife, Ecosystems, Weather Patterns, and even the Climate,” National Geographic, accessed February 13, 2022, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/article/deforestation.
9. “Sixth Assessment Report. Working Group 1: The Physical Science Basis,” Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, August 9, 2021, accessed January 5, 2022, https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGI_Headline_Statements.pdf.
10. Andrew Darby, The Ancients: Discovering the World’s Oldest Surviving Trees in Wild Tasmania. (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2025) 154-156.
11. The Tree Projects. https://www.thetreeprojects.com/carbon-paper 12.
12. David Lindenmayer, The Forest Wars. (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2024)

13. Eva Selhub and Alan C. Logan, Your Brain on Nature: The Science of Nature’s Influence on Your Health, Happiness, and Vitality (New York: Wiley, 2012), 17-21.
14. “Reducing Airline Emissions by Protecting Forests,” Conservation International, accessed May 27, 2017, https://www.conservation.org/stories/reducing-airline-emissions-by-protecting-forests.
15. Roger Cook, The Tree of Life, ( London: Thames and Hudson, 1988)
16. 16. Louise Fowler-Smith, “Adorning and Adoring: The Sacred Trees of India,” Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture (2018).

17. Fowler-Smith, Ibid
18. EcoArt Network. https://www.ecoartnetwork.org/
19. Rebecca Huntley, How to Talk About Climate Change in a Way that Makes a Difference. (Sydney: Murdoch Books, 2020)

20. Fowler-Smith, Ibid

………………………………………………..

https://www.louisefowlersmith.com/

Art, Climate Change, Ecology, Education, Environment, Nature