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Pawpaw leaves at Lloyd W. Bender Memorial Forest

Posted by: ACRES Land Trust

  • 10/11/2024

Always Learning From Nature

Over the last 18 years, I’ve visited ACRES preserves countless times, learning valuable lessons from nature itself. I live on an ACRES preserve and also volunteered to maintain Hathaway Preserve at Ross Run for 10 years. Even on the properties I’ve visited weekly for over a decade, I still get surprised.

Nature is so diverse and resourceful that even when you pay keen attention and learn the rhythms within a particular place, nature still finds new ways to keep you on your toes.

Pawpaw Trees: Nature’s Response To Weather

After a particularly long hot spell this summer, I saw many immature pawpaw fruit lying on the forest floor. It was the first time I had seen the trees abort fruit, seemingly to cut down on water consumption. I’ve seen immature pawpaws abort fruit, and many pawpaws will self-thin some fruit in June, but I’ve never seen anything like this widescale drop—from immature to mature trees, and nearly half the fruit from each tree.

Nature’s “Intelligence”

The “decision-making” of this impressed me. It’s a “rational” choice—if you are running short of water, it “makes sense” to forfeit some fruit to save the whole tree. You’re still producing seeds, just not as many this year. All the words in quotations are things only available to conscious beings. Since trees aren’t conscious, these “decisions” are made through chemical and structural reactions to growing conditions.

That’s impressive—trees without brains taking the same action that we with brains would. To me, it’s more impressive to do that without a brain than with one! Each time we walk down the same path, we aren’t the same person who walked it the last time. We constantly change, and so does nature. I enjoy the familiarity and surprises that preserve visits provide.

Go explore a preserve—see what’s new today!

Sincerely,
Jason Kissel

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