Forests used as powerplant, WiFi, sensors, cameras, servers etc?

[Sol Logos]

I know the title is a wild claim, but its something that I was pondering on while spending time in a rainforest. What struck me was the diversity and complexity in the forest and it made sense to me at the time there's likely some kind of electric and magnetic field that results from that abundance of life, and that this might not just power our devices but also enhance technology. What I mean by enhance is that trees have various sensors of their environment for example detecting light and atmospheric changes.

Anyway I went around and searched what I could find that might give this notion some feasibility. Here's some I found:

Forests charge the Earth's magnetic field

Although little known trees play a major in helping to conserve the intensity of the Earth's magnetic field. A Forest has a variety of countless parallel vegetable electrical conductors. Because of their sap flow, Plants and trees constantly release the air electrical tension voltage between the earth and the ionosphere

"The electromagnetic influence of the forests is conducted through magnetic fields in the core where it induces electrical currents, thus in turn creating magnetic fields. In this way the vegetation has a charging effect on the Earth's magnetic fields. This becomes evident by the correlation between the density of vegetation and the declination of the Earth's magnetic field."

http://www.unep.org/documents.multilingual/default.asp?DocumentID=445&ArticleID=4846&l=en

Scientists are also exploring how the messages from these signals might spread. Just a few months ago, the plant signaling pioneer Ted Farmer of the University of Lausanne discovered an almost entirely unrecognized way that plants transmit information — with electrical pulses and a system of voltage-based signaling that is eerily reminiscent of the animal nervous system. “It’s pretty spectacular what plants do,” said Farmer. “The more I work on them, the more I’m amazed.”
http://www.wired.com/2013/12/secret-language-of-plants/

To extract electricity from trees and convert it into useful energy, researchers built a boost converter capable of picking up as little as a 20 millivolt output and storing it to produce a greater output. By hooking it up to a tree using electrodes, the custom-built device was able to generate an output voltage of 1.1 volts, enough to run low-power sensors.
http://m.livescience.com/5711-electricity-harvested-trees.html

Also the research paper / patent: http://rexresearch.com/wadlevoltree/wadlevoltree.htm

I also noticed there's a few articles and papers that look at how WiFi disrupts growth and survival of trees, but also how growth can be enhanced by electricity. Seems to suggest to me at least that there's potential to misalign and disrupt or align and enhance signal strength of plants. Probably not the right use of terms but does that make sense?

Here's something on that:

ELECTRICITY plays a vital role in transmitting nerve signals in every animal species on earth, but plants too seem to be influenced by electric current, even though they have no nervous systems. Research workers are finding evidence that plant cells' sensitivity to electric current can be exploited to enhance their growth...

http://www.nytimes.com/1985/04/09/science/electricity-may-play-role-in-plant-growth.html

The girls placed six trays of Lepidium sativum seeds (a garden cress grown commercially throughout Europe) in a room without radiation, and an equal amount in a room next to two Wi-Fi routers. Over a 12-day period, they observed, measured, weighed and photographed the results. Even before the 12th day arrived, however, the end results were obvious: The cress seeds placed near the routers either hadn't grown or were completely dead, while the seeds placed in the radiation-free room had blossomed into healthy plants.

The experiment earned the five students top honors in a regional science competition. Moreover, according to a teacher at their school, Kim Horsevad, a professor of neuroscience at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden was so impressed with the experiment that he is interested in repeating it in a controlled scientific environment.

http://www.naturalnews.com/043238_Wi-Fi_routers_radiation_plant_growth.html#ixzz3vD0G05vT

I've got a feeling current analysis only touches on the surface of this and perhaps we could utilise the electric nature and sensitivity of plants in ways not yet conceived but do so in a way that's aligned with nature and not opposed to it.

Interested in your thoughts / discussion if you feel it worthwhile.

 

[zak]

alkhemst:

I've got a feeling current analysis only touches on the surface of this and perhaps we could utilise the electric nature and sensitivity of plants in ways not yet conceived but do so in a way that's aligned with nature and not opposed to it.

Interested in your thoughts / discussion if you feel it worthwhile.

I dunno, just taking the past/actual ecocide of the nature, until that enough people understand the "nature" of the psychopaths, it will
as now be in the detriment of the nature. Yeah it's a shortcut !
Anyway i 'm going to try to follow your suggestion, but maybe first we have to understand "the electric nature" of the plants,
in my case trees.
V. Schauberger described trees in a visible way and invisible, at one moment
he described tree as a biocondensator:

"... This vital force vehicle with it an electrical charge. The process of growth and development of any organization that requires enhanced night or potentiated by a mechanism, the biocondensation.
(With) Water and photosynthesis, the tree fulfills the function of biocondensateur which aims to increase the efficiency of the vital force at the ends of branches and roots ... annual circles behaving like dielectric between the electrically loaded. When these latter zones are close together, the potential increases, which occurs earlier in the trunk. Its central part is the seat of some growth, but the ends of the new drives it is the most marked.
Over the tree grows, the trunk diameter decreases, which brings the annual circles while increasing the bioelectric potential, which is very high at the top.
Finally it is in the leaves themselves as the energy potential is maximal.
His son Walter:
This is by inserting probes copperplated between the cambium and the heartwood of the trunk that Walter Schauberger could detect electrical charges of significant intensity sufficient to ignite the small bulb of a flashlight.
Over the tree was healthy, natural growth, the more light was bright. "
And:

"The Dr. H.Burr, of Yale University, conducts many recordings of voltage changes occurring inside holes in tree trunks.
When he introduced the two ends of an electric wire in two remote holes vertically one meter, he betrayed an electric current, ascending or descending, of varying intensity, with a frequency independent of the lunar phases, but sensitive to other influences that land and unidentified.
These records all the trees, even hundred kilometers apart, simultaneously undergoing changes in voltage and current direction of the same.
It is as if all the trees were reacting the same electric pace, comparable to a cosmic breath "

" The mathematician L.Edwards discovered that the buds of trees open and close according to a curious rhythm, species specific.
He applied the concept of Steiner wherein a specie often maintains, in analog form, a special relationship with a planet.
The results clearly showed that the pulsations of these buds are relevant to the data planets cycles.
Examples include oak and Mars, Saturn and beech; the moon alone has little effect, but if we increase its influence by aligning with Mars and Saturn, it displays an unmistakable rhythm based on 15 days.
However, one of the beeches studied differed from others; we see that drove a few meters of a power substation "

(It will be interesting to know in what way he differs of others)


Also something not electrical, but useful from the depolluting plants:

Contrary to what is sometimes argued, electromagnetic waves, generated among other computers and Wi-Fi transmitters, are not absorbed by plants.

Although the plant itself absorbs some pollutants through the leaves, the soil in which it grows, as well as microorganisms who gather also contribute.
(...)
In the literature review made by Korte and collaborators in 2000, we note that all pollutants are causing damage to the structure of plant cells to varying degrees. Having observed a decrease in photosynthesis in plants subjected to volatile organic compounds, Yoo et al conclude that they have a negative effect on the physiology of plants

So the plants gonna make electricity for us,( knowing already (for trees) are the most massive, longest lived and tallest organisms ever to inhabit
earth, supporting more communities of living things than others organism on earth, and still useful dead)
that gonna be use to reload our smartphone connected by Wifi, that gonna destroy them slowly...
:)

Well i hope that you understand where i wanted to arrive !
And thanks for the links, pretty interesting!

About 'Volatile Organic Compound':

"The forest attracts the rain by releasing VOC in the air that attach to atmospheric particles and block the clouds above the areas suffering from drought"

F.Hallé

http://amazonpire.org/documents/Jardine_VolatilePlantMetabolites.pdf

 

[Sol Logos]

Thanks for tour reaponse and furher links. Psychopaths will certainly be on the look out for anything that might threaten or strengthen their hold on people, for me its a separate point to the question of why investigate an idea, but certainly not an unimportant one.

Anyway assuming there's practical and feasible solutions by utilising the electric nature of plants, probably better to say ecosystems, then part of developing those solutions would need to consider not destroying those same ecosystems, as that defeat the purpose. But yes, not that defeating the purpose has been a real deterrent in the past when building on ideas.

I'm going to look into it some more from the limits of my current understanding, will post whatever else I find. Thanks again for your input Zak!

 

[RflctnOfU]

This reminds me of what G describes in (I think) Meetings with Remarkable Men re witnessing plants grow or wither in the presence of music. An interesting line of research would be how (and if) sound vibrations affect electrical conductivity and/or magnetic fields...I have a suspicion that the materials from which a sound vibration emanates would ultimately have to be taken into account...as well as the tonal center, or the frequency of "Do".

Kris

 

[Sol Logos]

This reminds me of what G describes in (I think) Meetings with Remarkable Men re witnessing plants grow or wither in the presence of music. An interesting line of research would be how (and if) sound vibrations affect electrical conductivity and/or magnetic fields...I have a suspicion that the materials from which a sound vibration emanates would ultimately have to be taken into account...as well as the tonal center, or the frequency of "Do".

Kris

Thanks Kris, I reckon there's a harmonic connection to the frequency of the sound spectrum to the light spectrum, so it makes sense this connection would also influence the electromagnetic spectrum. The way I see it is that the earth and all life on it follow a rythmic pattern, like a heartbeat and a lot of what we create, like WiFi isnt harmonically aligned with that, so it disrupts the natural rhythm. My hunce is that rhythm is best expressed in nature by phi patterns (golden mean etc.), in the way things grow but potentially in the way fields of energy are structured too.

These are just hunches, sorry its not very scientific.

On the idea of storing of data, I also see that so much of that is encoded in the way plants grow, easiest example is the rings on the tree pointing to where the source of light would be. That's got a lot to do with our leaves "know" where light is and move accordingly, so are called phototrophic. So there's also potential to not only store data (upload it), but also retreive it (download) using plants. For example different bursts of red and blue light could represent any series of 0s and 1s and then we have the basis of digital data potentially encoded within plants.

NASA did some work on a very different subject about how plants respond to different light spectrums in space that's interesting in this regard:
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/310.html

This kind of means that in some rudimentary form, light data from the time any given plant starts its grow is already encoded within every plant. So essentially there's a video file stored by the plant as well as a 24/7 camera too.

If indeed any of this wasn't just science fiction and wild claims, there are terrible implications for being able to access such information, but perhaps technology we have isn't a device related thing, but in us, given we might be our own device, and our alignment emotionally and spiritually is what's required to access this, and that's something psychopaths can't do?

 

[Dylan]

Plants are fascinating things!

http://www.amazon.ca/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=empire+of+the+beetle&tag=msncahydra-20&index=aps&hvadid=1733294372&hvqmt=e&hvbmt=be&hvdev=m&ref=pd_sl_1dpa4ccyjr_e

In a book called 'Empire of the Beetle,' Andrew Nikiforuk describes an artist who hooks up audio sensors to pinyon pine trees in the southwest US. The artist records the 'music' coming from the trees and it seems to him to follow a certain harmonic pattern. The interesting thing happens when he inadvertently records trees which come under attack from the dendroctonus beetle, which is responsible for devastation of pine trees in our poorly managed pine forests. The attack of the beetle not only carries with it it's own sound of beetles furiously burrowing through tree bark, but also the sound of the beetles communicating with each other using their carapace much like crickets do. The artist posits that there may be a way to deter beetles from attacking trees by mimicking the signals given by the beetles from within a tree that suggests to wandering attackers that the tree is at capacity and for the wanderer to look elsewhere.

There is definitely a secret language used by plant and animal species which is based on acoustics. As well, there are chemical signals emitted by both plants and animals. And, as this thread points out, perhaps electrical current plays a major role in the way in which plants operate.

I find the natural world to be full of wonderful trivia and knowledge!

 

[zak]

alkhemst:

If indeed any of this wasn't just science fiction and wild claims, there are terrible implications for being able to access such information, but perhaps technology we have isn't a device related thing, but in us, given we might be our own device, and our alignment emotionally and spiritually is what's required to access this, and that's something psychopaths can't do?

Jeremy Narby wrote:

Chapter 9 – Receptors and Transmitters

Narby’s working hypothesis:

Shamans take their consciousness down to the molecular level and gain access to information related to DNA, which they call “animate essences” or “spirits.” This is where they see double helixes, twisted ladders, and chromosome shapes. This is how shamanic cultures have known for millennia that the vital principle is the same for all living beings and is shaped like two entwined serpents ( or a vine, a rope, a ladder…). DNA is the source of their astonishing botanical and medicinal knowledge, which can be attained only in defocalized and “non-rational” states of consciousness, though its results are empirically verifiable.

Knowing his hypothesis would be more solid if it rested on a neurological basis, he decided to direct his investigation by taking ayahuasqueros at their word—and they unanimously claimed that certain psychoactive substances (containing molecules that are active in the human brain) influence the spirits in precise ways.

Since shamans felt about tobacco the same way they felt about ayahuasca, he thought it ought to be possible to find correspondences between these shamanic notions and facts established by the study of the neurological activity of tobacco. There ought to be an analogous connection between nicotine and DNA contained in the nerve cells of a human brain.

See P.118 for details. A molecule of nicotine shares structural similarities with the neurotransmitter acetylcholine and fits into that receptor on certain neurons. The more you give nicotine to your neurons, the more the DNA they contain activates the construction of nicotinic receptors, within certain limits.

The degree of correspondence between shamanic notions of tobacco and neurological studies of nicotine surprised him. But it didn’t explain the effects of nicotine on consciousness. He makes significant comments on tobacco, but finding a neurological trail of tobacco-induced hallucinations was a dead end. See P.120. That left ayahuasca.

The active psychoactive ingredient in ayahuasca is dimethyltryptamine (DMT). DMT is produced in small quantities in the brain. It is a controlled substance, so there isn’t much info on it. DMT, The Spirit Molecule by Rick Strassman, a report on the only study available didn’t answer how molecular reality become accessible to the normally non-molecular consciousness of human beings.

It has been known that hallucinogenic substances resemble the neurotransmitter seratonin for over a quarter century. But it wasn’t until the 90’s that they discovered the existence of seven types of seratonin receptors, in relation to which each hallucinogen has a specific mode of functioning. Six of the receptors resembled antennae, which span the cell’s membrane.

When seratonin stimulates these antenna, it sets off a signal that increases DNA synthesis, but it still doesn’t explain the cascade of reactions inside the cell. Current research on the neurological mechanisms of hallucinogens stops at the question of receptors.

Currently, DNA is not part of the scientific discussion on hallucinations. Prior to the mid-70’s poor research led to misinformation. After the mid-70’s the connection between DNA and hallucinogens disappears from the scientific literature.

Because of his hypothesis that DNA was, like the axis mundi, the source of shamanic knowledge and visions, Narby needed to understand how DNA could transmit visual information.

DNA emits photons in the form of electromagnetic waves. Carlos Perez Shuma compared spirits to “radio waves.” “Once you turn on the radio, you can pick them up…” “…with ayahuasca and tobacco, you can see and hear them”, the spirits.

In the early 80’s, scientists demonstrated all living cells emit photons, approx. 100/sec. Per sq. centimeter. They also showed that DNA was the source. Also, the wavelength at which DNA emits these photons corresponds exactly to the narrow band of visible light! P.126

But there was no proof that the light emitted by DNA was what shamans saw in their visions. There was also the problem that the intensity of a photon emission corresponded to the intensity of a candle at a distance of about 10 kilometers, yet was highly coherent, like a laser. How?

Narby learned that the coherence of biophotons depended not so much on the intensity of their output as on its regularity. DNA emits photons with such regularity that researchers compare the phenomenon to an “ultra-weak laser.” A coherent light source, like a laser, gives the sensation of bright colors, a luminescence, and an impression of holographic depth.

This was the essential element. Descriptions of ayahuasca-based hallucinatory experiences invariably mention bright colors and in DMT studies, subjects described colors as brighter, more intense, and deeply saturated. The colors were 10 to 100 times more saturated.



DNA’S highly coherent photon emission accounted for the luminescence of hallucinatory images, as well as their three-dimensional, or holographic, aspect! There was now a neurological mechanism for which to pursue Narby’s hypothesis. If the ayahuasqueros perceive DNA-emitted photons in their visions, it should be possible to link photons and consciousness. Next step: biophotons, a new field of study.

In this field of study biophoton emissions are considered a “cellular language” or a form of “nonsubstantial biocommunication between cells, cells and organisms and to direct their own internal reactions, P.127. [This could explain how billions of individual plankton organisms cooperate in swarms.]

Admittedly, Narby concedes that his theory has a difficult road to traverse to bring it even into consideration by a respectable number of biologists. Biologists Mae-Wan Ho and Fritz-Albert Popp suggest that many colleagues find the idea that the cell is a solid-state system difficult to imagine, “as few of us have the requisite biophysical background to appreciate the implications.”

So there he was: In his search, he couldn’t find any connection between DAN-emitted photons and consciousness, nor could he find any publications dealing with subject of the influence of nicotine or DMT on biophoton emissions.

He did, however, after a conversation with Popp did receive confirmation on “a good number of my impressions.” Asking him whether he had considered the possibility of a connection between DNA’s photon emission and consciousness, Popp replied: “Yes, consciousness could be the electromagnetic field constituted by the sum of these emissions. But, as you know, our understanding of the neurological basis of consciousness is still very limited.”

One more element of thought before Narby expands his hypothesis from the beginning of the chapter: He observed that almost off of the experiments conducted to measure biophotons involved the use of quartz. In 1923 Gurvich noticed cells separated by a quartz screen mutually influenced each other’s multiplication processes. P.128

50-some years later, a device made of quartz was developed that measured this ultra-weak radiation. Quartz is a crystal, and crystal has an extremely regular arrangement of atoms that vibrate at a very stable frequency. This makes it an excellent receptor and emitter of electromagnetic waves, which is why it is used in electronic technologies.

Quartz crystals are used in shamanism around the world. P.129 Amazonian shamans, in particular, consider that spirits can materialize and become visible in quartz crystals. “What if these spirits were non other than the biophotons emitted by all the cell of the world and were picked up, amplified, and transmitted by shaman’ quartz crystals…? This would mean that spirits are being of pure light—as has always been claimed,” !!!

“DNA is also a crystal. Maxim Frank-Kamenetskii, a molecular biologist, explains: ‘the base pairs in it are arranged as in a crystal…a linear, one-dimensional crystal…DNA is aperiodic…a crystal of an entirely new type…’ The four DNA bases are hexagonal (like quartz crystals)…they stack up on top of each other, forming the rungs of the twisted ladder…in the order…by the genetic text…a slightly irregular, or aperiodic, structure…not the case for the repeat sequences…a full third of the genome…DNA becomes a regular arrangement of atoms, a periodic crystal…The variation in the length of the repeat sequences would help pick up different frequencies and could thereby constitute a possible and new function for q part of “junk” DNA.”



Narby’s hypothesis extended: What if DNA, stimulated by nicotine or DMT, activates not only its emission of photons (which inundate our consciousness in the form of hallucinations), but also its capacity to pick up the photons emitted by the global network of DNA-based life? This would mean that the biosphere itself, which can be considered “as a more or less fully interlinked unit,” is the source of the images.

http://cassiopaea.org/forum/index.php/topic,7462.msg53766.html#msg53766

 

[Sol Logos]

Plants are fascinating things!

http://www.amazon.ca/s/?ie=UTF8&keywords=empire+of+the+beetle&tag=msncahydra-20&index=aps&hvadid=1733294372&hvqmt=e&hvbmt=be&hvdev=m&ref=pd_sl_1dpa4ccyjr_e

In a book called 'Empire of the Beetle,' Andrew Nikiforuk describes an artist who hooks up audio sensors to pinyon pine trees in the southwest US. The artist records the 'music' coming from the trees and it seems to him to follow a certain harmonic pattern. The interesting thing happens when he inadvertently records trees which come under attack from the dendroctonus beetle, which is responsible for devastation of pine trees in our poorly managed pine forests. The attack of the beetle not only carries with it it's own sound of beetles furiously burrowing through tree bark, but also the sound of the beetles communicating with each other using their carapace much like crickets do. The artist posits that there may be a way to deter beetles from attacking trees by mimicking the signals given by the beetles from within a tree that suggests to wandering attackers that the tree is at capacity and for the wanderer to look elsewhere.

There is definitely a secret language used by plant and animal species which is based on acoustics. As well, there are chemical signals emitted by both plants and animals. And, as this thread points out, perhaps electrical current plays a major role in the way in which plants operate.

I find the natural world to be full of wonderful trivia and knowledge!

Agree, its mind blowing really. Read a similar thing about bees and plants:

He explained that bees have a positive electrical charge because they fly in air, which is full of all kinds of tiny particles, such as dust and charged molecules. Friction from these particles causes bees to lose electrons, leaving bumblebees positively charged.
Flowers, on the other hand, “are electrically connected to ground,” he said. Unlike copper wire, which transfers charges very quickly, plants conduct electricity very slowly and tend to possess a negative charge.
For the study, Robert and his team placed petunia flowers in an area with free-flying foraging bees. The researchers then studied how interactions between the two changed the electric fields and the bees’ behavior.
They determined that when a bee lands on a flower, this generates its own electrical field, and therefore a force. It’s as though a mini spark results when the two connect.
Robert and his colleagues believe “that the bee can sense this electrically induced force.” It appears to improve the bee’s memory of flower rewards, such as pollen and nectar, affecting later foraging.
The flower, in turn, is electrically changed for a short period after the interaction.

http://news.discovery.com/earth/plants/flowers-communicate-with-electricity-130221.htm

 

[Sol Logos]

This is a fascinating read in terms of practical set up of some of the ideas mentioned above. Apparently in the early part of last century trees had been set up as towers sending out radio waves as well antennas to receive them. Here's a decription and pic that shows how it was set up:

Electrical Experimenter ( July 1919 ), p. 204

Talking Through The Trees

by

Major-General George O. Squier

(Chief Signal Officer, US Army)

How Transatlantic Radio messages Are Copied Via Tree Antenna

As long ago as 1904, the author conducted some experiments with a view to utilizing growing trees as antennae for radio-telegraphy and discovered the efficacy, in a general way, of using a direct metallic contact to certain trees (principally Eucalyptus) to increase the audibility of radio signals. My attention was first called to this phenomenon during the course of summer maneuvers of the Army at Camp Atascadero, CA, where, due to the prevalence of the dry season of the soil, it was found that the regular Army buzzer telephone and telegraph sets were inoperative with any ordinary ground or earth but became operative when connected to a metallic nail driven in the trunk or roots of a live tree. This incident led the author to pursue the subject experimentally in the autumn of 1904 continuing the experiments to the range of frequencies than employed in radio-telegraphy.

Tree Antennae

In connection with the organization and development of Transatlantic radio reception, which was carried out during the period of the war to provide against the possibility of the interruption of the submarine cable system, the Signal Corps established a chain of special receiving stations in different parts of the United States to copy and record enemy and Allied radio messages from European stations for the information of our Army General Staff.

In the prosecution of this work, directions were given to the Signal Corps Laboratory at Camp Alfred Vail, Little Silver, NJ, and also to the experimental staff in Washington to test the efficiency of growing trees as receiving antenna, in connection with this service, using the vastly superior technique and facilities now represented in the radio Art as compared with the crude apparatus with which the discovery was made in 1904. With a collection of apparatus representing the most advanced state of the radio Art, the problem, as a war measure, was attacked anew and has now reached a point where a very brief outline of some of the physical results obtained should be presented in the interests of the development of the Art in general. Since the phenomena involved embrace a variety of physical problems rather than strictly engineering ones, these data are presented in the hope that our scientists may see in the experiments some points of departure for further research.

It was immediately discovered that with the sensitive amplifiers now in use it was possible to receive signals from the principal European stations by simply laying a small wire netting on the ground beneath the tree and connecting an insulated wire to a nail driven in the tree well within the outline of the tree top. See Figure 1. Messages having been received from England, France, Germany and Italy.

This encouraging first result justified a more careful examination of the phenomena and the most suitable arrangement of circuits for the purpose.

And Now For the Floraphone

The messages carried over this tree telephone and telegram system have been named by the writer. They are to be ‘floragrams’. The tree telephone is to be a ‘floraphone’; the tree telegraph a ‘floragraph’.

The discovery is now announced after experiments covering 15 years, beginning in California and continuing intermittently until the outbreak of the war, when they went forward with vigor as an emergency means of communication. The system was utilized during the war in listening-in on the German radio communication.

The final development took place in a small portable laboratory, purchased from a mail order house, capable of being carried to any place in the woods. A group of soldiers, taking turns at copying messages, assisted the writer in the development of the apparatus.

Without entering into the details of these preliminary experiments here it may be said that one fo the best receiving arrangements is found to be an elevated tree earth-terminal in the upper part of the tree top, and an earth consisting practically of several short pieces of insulated wire, sealed at the outer end, radiating out from a common center, and buried a few inches beneath the surface of the ground in the neighborhood of the tree. See Figure 2.

It was soon found that a tree-antenna could be used efficiently as a multiple radio receiving set over widely different wavelengths, see Figure 3A, receiving either from separate terminals at the same (shown dotted in Figure 3A) or different heights of the tree, or in series from the same terminal. See Figure 3B.

This same type of circuit was employed in an inverse manner for radio-telephonic transmitting purposes, although the experiments thus far have been limited to short distances. It was found that 2-way radio-telephonic communication was easily established with remarkably low values of transmitting antenna current. See diagram of this test illustrated at Figure 4.

The flexibility of this arrangement is very striking. The linking up of wire and wireless methods was found to be both convenient and efficient. Radio-telephonic messages from airplanes were readily received by the tree-antenna arrangement and transferred thence to the wire system of the city of Washington and finally received at any point desired.

Furthermore, radio-telephonic transmission through the tree-antenna was received by another tree-antenna, and automatically returned to the sender on a wire system, thus making a complete circuit. Illustrated at Figure 6.

Long distance reception on any wave length from all the larger European stations and from our ships at sea was easily accomplished and traffic copied on a 24 hour schedule by the regular enlisted operators of the Signal Corps. A small portable house serving as a field laboratory was erected in the midst of the forest area on Grant Road, Washington DC, and here was assembled a collection of amplifiers from the Army, navy, the British and French, and American manufacturers. With these facilities it was a matter of a few days to test out, at least in a superficial manner, a large number of proposed arrangements using trees as antenna.

Figure 7 shows how a number of trees can be connected up to give the effect of one large antenna.

In France officers of the Signal Corps, by the simple device of driving a spike into a tree-trunk to which connect the audion set which wireless operators use to make up wireless messages, it was found possible to listen in on communications between German airplanes and the German lines. Messages were thus intercepted in spots into which it would have been impossible to transport a field wireless apparatus. See Figure 8.

The Physics of Tree Wireless

We may regard the metallic electrode rigidly driven into the living organism of a tree, as described above, as a potential earth-terminal for the study of the potential distribution on the surface of the earth itself. It has been shown in these experiments that this metallic terminal intimately connected to the earth itself and a part thereof is subject to changes of potential representing the innumerable frequencies required by modern radio-telephony and telegraphy, as well as any other electrical disturbances which may occur on the surface of the earth or the atmosphere above the earth.

It has also been shown, as expected, that we can select from this composite one or more of the different frequencies by tuned electrical loop circuits suitably connected to this electrode and study each in turn, at will, just as color screens can select a particular component of white light. We may, indeed, by means of a highly insulated conductor bring this terminal directly to the laboratory and connect it immediately to the modern thermionic tube and amplify almost at will the particular effects we are studying…

We can consider that trees have been pieces of electrical apparatus from their beginning and with their manifold chains of living cells are absorbers, conductors and radiators of the long electromagnetic waves as used in the radio Art.

For our present purpose we may consider, therefore, a growing tree as a higly organized piece of living earth, to be used in the same manner as we now use the earth as a universal conductor for telephony and telegraphy and other electrical purposes…

http://rexresearch.com/squier/squier.htm

It would be interesting to test this with a crystal radio set and see what frequencies come through. It would be also interesting to find what wavelengths are strongest coming from trees in this manner, as that would point to where energy would be strongest and more likely to be used as a power source.