THE HOLLOWED-OUT TRUNK of the ancient yellow
cedar felt like a cocoon with its soft floor of bark
strips. A mother bear had molded this bed when she
came each year to hibernate and to birth her cubs
inside the 2,000-year-old tree. In the depth of winter,
the shell of sapwood had protected them from the
bone-chilling cold and blowing snow.
A decade earlier, the mother likely had been born
in this same den, near the headwaters of Fairy Creek
on Vancouver Island, off the coast of British Colum-
bia. She would have returned each fall, fattened on
berries and salmon. I picked one of her hairs from
the grain of the wood, the scent of wet grass merging
with the citrusy heartwood and fresh Pacific rain.
I was here with several environmental activists.
Their opponents call them radicals, even eco-
terrorists. They call themselves forest defenders,BY SUZANNE SIMARD
AMID TREES MARKED FOR FELLING, A SCIENTIST SPELLS OUT FORESTS’
VITAL ROLE IN SAVING WILDLIFE, HUMANITY, AND A WARMING PLANET.
T
IN THIS SECTION
Seed Bank Alarm
The First Forest
Take to the Trees
Ghostly RedwoodsNATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC VOL. 241 NO. 5LIVES DEPEND
ON FORESTS
ILLUMINATING THE MYSTERIES—AND WONDERS—ALL AROUND US EVERY DAYEXPLORE
VANCOUVER ISLAND, BRITISH COLUMBIAMAY 2022 15