How Trees Bring Water

I have changed the title of this video from "How Trees Make Water" to "How Trees Bring Water". I still support the idea of trees "making" water available in the landscape. The second definition of "make" is: _ 'cause (something) to exist or come about_ '; bring about. But my use of the word "make" was distressing to many people, because trees don't actually construct water molecules from Hydrogen and Oxygen. And the point of this video is really to encourage the planting of trees as a tool for climate stabilization and landscape rehydration. Because Trees Bring Water :-)

I'm from southern India. Over the past 3 years I've planted 500+ trees on my 4 acre farm.

Absolutely spot on !! Very well explained & nicely illustrated too. Planting trees is definitely the solution for preventing drought and fixing soil conditions as well as bringing & retaining water & moisture within the soil structure. I like that your conclusion is to go and plant trees, particularly starting near the coast and working with nature to bring water further inland helping to prevent drought and deserts areas forming. I understand this fully and have been planting trees recently in the UK, England, Cornwall. I have planted many native trees and will continue to plant many many more…🌱 Trees also soak up and store co2 & release oxygen in return which enables life to exist. I have been planting common alder this week which also helps to fix nitrogen back into the ground. There are so many benefits that come from trees and woodland areas. They provide shade, habitat, leaf matter, as well as the roots and all life that exists around it helping to nourish and aerate the soil. If you take a tree, plant at least two to replace it. Well don’t stop there, simply keep on planting more & more trees. Work with nature and become a part of it. Personally I find the whole process of planting trees extremely satisfying & rewarding… 🌱🌱

The point you make at 4:20 is probably the most important of all of them. These raindrop nucleation centers are SO critically important. Another great example of this is when you have very very pure distilled water and cool it in a freezer to below freezing. It will still remain as a liquid until the water is shaken, then it instantly freezes. I'm sure most of us have experienced this. This happens because the very pure water doesn't have many nucleation sites to start (nucleate) an ice particle in the water. It's a bit of a different example, but just one that many people may have tangible experiences with. Similar things happen with very microscopically flat pots and boiling water well above boiling point before it boils. Then all of a sudden it flash-boils and can explode on someone. This happens often with microwaving water in a really smooth coffee cup. Trees creating nucleation centers for raindrop formation is so critically important. I didn't think you'd mention it, and I was going to come here and mention it, but I'm really glad you did, and makes me respect you even more as a fellow scientist/engineer.

This should be part of every grade 3 curriculum when talking about the water cycle, amazing. Still learning and changing my view of the world after 40 years.

This is true. I've seen it happen with an extinct volcano in our area. 200 years ago they cut all the trees away and the lake dried up. Then someone discovered an old painting of the volcano and surprised to see so many trees there. They gave the volcano land back to indigenous people and they replanted with native trees. During the last 10 years I have seen the lake fill up. The bird life that has come back to the sanctuary and the Wildlife in general is incredible.

On top of that, the shade from a tree reduces evaporation and creates a micro climate that can be noticeably cooler. 🌳 Thanks for the great video, you are great at sharing knowledge!

Love this! The timing is perfect! We're educating children about reviving our lake in the neighborhood. How reintroducing native vegetation can rejuvenate water and purify the water body. Love the presentation. Thank you for your work Andrew!

Permaculture makes me hopeful about the future. These videos are great to explain to everyone with eyes to see why trees are so important. If you plant trees with edibles for humans it becomes a win win win for humans, nature and the many creatures we share our planet with. Thank you for making and sharing these great videos. I will do my best in spreading this information in my networks to get the information as far out as I can help with.

I watch this video couple of times and this is really great. I am living in California and we need more trees, plants. I do view that if someone can grow plants in the undeveloped areas and make a small pond and grow plants, it would bring the whole area from desert to forest.

Excellent Talk was a very detailed fantastic illustration. Thank you Andrew

Andrew, there is one seldom explained effect that you didn't mention. Besides trees, a well formed forest also contains a stratification of intermediate species, the layers of mid canopy, understory and ground covering plants. Stratification within a well formed forest system with all it's layers creates a temperature gradient with higher temperature within the high strata in the top of the trees down to the cooler temperature in the understory, and the coolest temperature in the lowest ground cover layer. Since cool air is denser, that temperature gradient creates air flow downward through the different strata with air flow eventually reaching the ground. As air cools, it tends to condense water on leaf surfaces in the lower strata, further contributing to water capture beyond what happens in the upper canopy you describe. Even underground, the fungal web can absorb humidity directly from atmosphere, if the soil is permeable and aerated. This means that not only are condensed water droplets absorbed, but also invisible water vapor can directly get into the soil. One reason why this is so important is that if you compare an unstratified monocultured forest to a fully stratified forest, the stratified forest will exhibit the above described phenomenon while the unstratified forest will exhibit the opposite. In unstratified pine or eucalypt plantations without understory plants, the net moisture flux will be negative because no downward airflow occurs.

I hope your info and wonderful style of teaching reaches the younger generation and inspires them to manage our resources better

Thank You for this great information. When I was younger back in the 60's and 70's I was a logger in northern California and i started noticing that the amount of annual rain fall started to decrease, at this time I started to wonder if the reduction of trees in the conifer forests had an impact on the rain and now I see that it does, I also think that clear cutting was a big mistake.

This video was so well put together. You are a fabulous teacher for such an incredibly important subject. Over the past two years I’ve planted several trees on my tiny little property. I’m so excited even more now.

I grew up in Germany, where we were taught about the beneficial effects of trees and rain 60 YEARS AGO!

Beautiful and effective illustrations, what a great educator

I live in Kansas where there aren’t very many trees 😢. And some that are here don’t look very healthy. Loved you presentation. Things I have felt, but did not “know”.

So impressed with this video, and happy to hear it. Yes, I'm planting trees, and I support those organizations who do as well. When I see countries investing in tree planting programs, like Iceland or Scotland, it really makes me happy. I've read that North Africa used to be green, with trees, lakes, not a desert at all, and Babylon too. All over the world, where trees were removed, the land suffered, and then the people suffered.

Awesome job in communicating that well and with the drawing. it is almost exactly what I have observed over decades of doing reforestation work. in Ecuador in the late 90's UBC Canada researchers where putting up water particle nets, but they plugged up with the living air plants. it was a time of pushing the carbon credit imported pine tree mono platations in the wrong echo system, as I witnessed indigenous communities destroy small native patches of high elevation brush forest. so a few of us pushed for a native tree nursery we built up, yet sadly the centre for studies and international cooperation told me they cut there environmental part of community development. I found however near the cloud nets that "Chilca Negra" grew like a wild native "weed" but its leaves formation act as partial channels to the hexagon stem that is slightly indented to drop the water to the base root of the plant. its a incredible natural technology of nature. sadly tho the climate change gatherings tend to divert attention from deforestation. where I sense the big issue is "investors" want to make quick return of profits from there investment by simple log and simple lumber and chip exports. Rather then community selectively log the trees that are beginning to rot or over crowd, and then processing locally the wood in to finished local products where you can not then make money from investing money, but you have to do the work to make a living and so many others can as well.