Many of the characters in The Wild Trees seem to explore things that haven’t been explored. To discover things people didn’t want or would think of doing. In the beginning of the book, Steve Sillett suffered from acrophobia — a fear of heights — so he was at the top of one tree about to do a “leap of faith” onto another. When Steve went to his biology professor in his office and told him how he collected it from the top of Nameless. Also, when Michael Taylor discovered a redwood that was near a busy road, and it never had been noticed. “At the outer limits of biology, on the edge of the possible” was said by Richard Preston is true because of how Steve Sillett and Michael Taylor made the impossible, possible. How they climbed higher heights and deeper depths to show that the things that people wouldn’t dream of doing, Steve and Michael lived it.
Steve Sillett, unlike any other person who suffers from acrophobia, climbs things. Followed by Marwood Harris climbing the younger redwood, he gets to the top of the young redwood. And in order, for him to get to Nameless—the extremely larger redwood—he had to jump on to. Not only was he afraid of heights, and the fact he had to jump after letting go of the young redwood to Nameless, there was yellow-jacket nest the size of a cannonball hanging unnoticeably beneath the branch Steve tried to get to. Some people would think this man is crazy. But he did what no other acrophobic would even think about consider doing. He made the jump without hitting the yellow-jackets nest. But not Marwood; he landed on the branch the nest was on and got stung. Steve proves that no matter what your phobia of is, if you love doing something, you won’t let that get into your way.
After climbing the ever growing Nameless Steve Sillett went to his biology professor, Professor Bert G. Brehm, in his office showed him what he collected, and how he collected it. Surprised and disturbed by his findings and how he found it, professor Brehm wanted to warn him of the dangers he put himself in when performing those tasks. Steve who was very fond of redwoods was very confident on what he did. Interested in examining what Steve brought—which were lichens—they grabbed a hand book on lichens, and found out that it’s a kind of Icelandic lichen most common in California, but no had ever found it at the top of a redwood. By Steve climbing Nameless, he discovered what may have taken over 50-100 years maybe to discover. He also discovered that the different species of lichens weren’t unknown, but the fact that they grew in redwood tress was unknown.
Michael Taylor would hike through different rain forest to try and to discover the world’s tallest tree. As he continued his search, he kept finding taller and taller redwoods than the previous one he thought was the tallest one. He even had a reoccurring dream of him finding the Ultimate Tree, but when he started to measure the angle to the top of the tree, he couldn’t see the top; so then the dream slowly fades away. Although he kept having a depressing dream of him not being able to measure the Ultimate Tree, he continued to search for it. He came to find out that when he found an extremely large redwood tree, it was surrounded by larger redwoods. By noticing this, he started exploring different rain forests for the Ultimate Tree. It wasn’t just some ordinary grove he went to it was something extraordinary.
The Wild Trees is an exciting and thrilling book, full of discoveries that people experienced. Richard Preston’s reference to the Wild Trees was very true because of the way his characters in his book strive to know more about these huge trees. Because many of his characters climbed redwoods even in life threatening situations, he was able to show how this book is living “at the outer limits of biology, on the edge of the possible. The people who thought the things these characters were doing was impossible, they were shown that the impossible has been done, Steve and many of the other characters in the book were literally on the edge of the impossible. The things we would never do to climb a redwood, Richard Preston shows you in this story. In conclusion, I now clearly see how the Wild Trees is referred to as living “at the outer limits of biology, on the edge of the possible” by Richard Preston.
