Food for thought?
About the trees feeding their siblings and offspring in the forest, new information is suggesting that the mycorrhiza actually decides where the nutrients go and it sometimes favour new better adapted tree species growth when faced with changes due to climate change.
What has now begun to be discovered is that the mycorrhizal fungi don’t surround just one tree. By using radioactive trace elements, the researchers were able to show that nutrients were being passed by the fungi between different species of trees over a large area. The trees that were not so good in the winter, like aspens, were being given food manufactured by the conifers, which do much better in winter, and vice versa. So the fungus is actually helping to distribute food amongst forest trees so that they all benefit at the right time.
[news.nationalgeographic.com]
That's awesome. I read once that tomato plants release a specific chemical that attracts wasps when aphids are devouring it. The wasps come, and eat the aphids. And that some trees actively try to kill other trees. Pretty fascinating.