Trees in the News

Australian Firefighters Saved Ancient Pine Trees From the Bushfires During a Secret Mission | KTLA

https://ktla.com/2020/01/15/australian-firefighters-saved-ancient-pine-trees-from-the-bushfires-during-a-secret-mission

Madacascar Is Planting 60 Million Trees in Ambitious Drive Inspired by Its President | Mongabay, Jan. 21, 2020; Reprinted by EcoWatch
- Madagascar has embarked on its most ambitious tree-planting drive yet, aiming to plant 60 million trees in the coming months. The island nation celebrates 60 years of independence this year, and the start of the planting campaign on Jan. 19 marked one year since the inauguration of President Andry Rajoelina, who has promised to restore Madagascar's lost forests.
Jan. 21, 2020 09:07AM ESThttps://www.ecowatch.com/madacascar-tree-planting-2644879937.html

Sprouting Seeds of Compassion - Can one person really make a difference? Marc Ian Barasch plants a seed of good intention...
By Mindful Staff, August 25, 2010, Photo by Jessica von Handorf
- I can almost pinpoint the moment when I decided to save the world. It was sometime after my Mom died—my Mom who was the secret solar center of my life; whose letters always ended in exuberant sign-offs (lovelovelove, three exclamation points); who’d insisted, despite her terminal diagnosis, that I not cancel my book tour because the subject—compassion—was, for her, life’s indispensable thread.
https://www.mindful.org/sprouting-seeds-of-compassion

Tu B'Shvat - Tu B'Shvat or the "New Year of the Trees" is Jewish Arbor Day. The holiday is observed on the 15th (tu) of the Hebrew month of Shvat. Scholars believe that originally Tu B'Shvat was an agricultural festival, marking the emergence of spring.

In the 17th century, Kabbalists created a ritual for Tu B'Shvat that is similar to a Passover seder. Today, many Jews hold a modern version of the Tu B'Shvat seder each year.

The holiday also has become a tree-planting festival in Israel, in which Israelis and Jews around the world plant trees in honor or in memory of loved ones and friends.

5 Ways to Celebrate Tu B'Shevat:

• Plant trees, seeds, or start an herb garden.
• Build a birdhouse to hang in a tree.
• Eat the seven significant species of the land of Israel: wheat, grapes, barley, figs, pomegranates, olives, and dates.
• Organize a park clean-up to collect litter.
• Make something for your home with reclaimed wood.

https://reformjudaism.org/jewish-holidays/tu-bishvat

The Atomic Tree
by Adam Loften & Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee
Published in "Emergence Magazine" - Issue 7 - Trees

The Atomic Tree is a journey into the memories of one of the most revered trees in the world—a 400-year-old Japanese white pine bonsai that witnessed and survived the atomic blast in Hiroshima. From Japan’s ancient cedar forests and Buddhist temples to the family home in Hiroshima where the pine was nurtured for five generations, this virtual reality experience explores the unbroken chain of living stories held within the rings of this tree. The delicate shape of this bonsai contains sacred forests, human family, and deep time, inviting us to reflect on the living strands of kinship that are woven between human and nonhuman worlds.

Enjoy a beautiful virtual reality experience here