July 2007 - Volume 68, Issue 7
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In this issue
NextGEN Departments
Treemendous Benefits
Ten ways that trees improve the quality of our lives.
Trees give us shade on blistering August afternoons, make cozy dens for families of pileated woodpeckers, yield wood for baseball bats and provide the pulp for the paper on which these words are printed. Almost everyone could make a long list of the many ways trees directly benefit our lives.
It might take a while, however, before they’d think to list relief from stress or increased vitality to our communities. These are just a couple of the social benefits of trees that researchers have identified. The more we study trees, the more we find that there’s even more to gain from them than just firewood, lumber and shade.
Trees as Healers
You are lying in bed in the hospital recovering from surgery and turn toward the window for some inspiration. A view of the air conditioner units on the adjacent roof will not provide as much restorative affect as a view of a more natural setting. You may recover from surgery faster if you can see trees outside your hospital window.
A six-year study of post-operative patients with the same type of surgery in the same hospital showed that patients with views of nature were able to be released a day sooner—eight days instead of nine days—than patients with “barren” window views. What’s more, patients with natural views requested less pain medication, and a study of nurses’ notes confirmed those patients generally reported feeling better.
Another study found that inmates with views of farm fields from their cells requested fewer trips to the infirmary than inmates without a “natural” view from their cells.
About This Article
Author
ANN KOENIG has worked as a forester for the
Conservation Department for 10 years and is
a Certified arborist. She lives in Columbia with
the three men in her life (her husband and two
young sons) and 36 yard trees all of whom she
loves dearly. as an urban forester, Ann helps
towns in central Missouri maintain and enhance
their community forest.
Photographer
Photographer DAVID STONNER, shown working on aerial photographs of the Mingo Basin in southeast Missouri, joined the Department of Conservation in May 2007. He lives in Jefferson City with his wife, Angela, and one year-old daughter, Maggie. David enjoys weekends sailing on Stockton Lake and angling for fish anywhere he can cast a dry fly.
