Under The Banyan

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What happened when Christian missionaries met Kenya’s sacred fig trees

April 11, 2018September 4, 2020 / mike shanahan / 4 Comments

768px-Ficus_natalensis,_habitus,_Manie_van_der_Schijff_BT,_a-b

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Feast your eyes on the forest’s green dreamscape

March 21, 2018April 13, 2018 / mike shanahan / 2 Comments

 

Strangler fig (Ficus kerkhovenii). Lambir Hills National Park, Sarawak
Lambir Hills National Park, Sarawak
Colugo (flying lemur) in Lambir Hills National Park, Sarawak

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Awe may be a forest’s least known gift

March 19, 2018April 13, 2018 / mike shanahan / Leave a comment
Biologist Rhett Harrison surrounded by many aerial roots of a single strangler fig (Ficus virens) on Long Island, Papua New Guinea. Credit: Mike Shanahan

Biologist Rhett Harrison surrounded by many aerial roots of a single strangler fig (Ficus virens) on Long Island, Papua New Guinea. Credit: Mike Shanahan

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Become an eye in the sky to help scientists count orangutans

February 19, 2018April 6, 2018 / mike shanahan / Leave a comment

Male_Bornean_Orangutan_-_Big_Cheeks2 Continue reading →

Will the bird that dodged a bullet pay the price of peace?

November 2, 2017March 20, 2019 / mike shanahan / 1 Comment

Blue-billed Curassow (Crax alberti) in Colombia's Aviario Nacional (national aviary) - Photo by Mike Shanahan

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Life and death and the jaguars of the mind

October 24, 2017November 16, 2017 / mike shanahan / Leave a comment

Jaguar attacking a tapir

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How 24 bodies transformed to tell one of nature’s most amazing stories

September 29, 2017October 1, 2018 / mike shanahan / 1 Comment

A strangler fig (left) and a banyan (right)

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The daredevil, the vanishing green sphinx and the plant that found a friend

September 23, 2017May 15, 2018 / mike shanahan / Leave a comment

Brighamia insignis - vulcan palm

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See what it’s like when a strangler fig explodes with life

September 1, 2017November 16, 2017 / mike shanahan / 2 Comments

Rhinoceros hornbills eating ripe figs

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Why one fig tree in the middle of nowhere has a 24-hour armed guard

July 28, 2017July 20, 2018 / mike shanahan / 1 Comment

homeguard2

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My book

I am the author of 'Ladders To Heaven: How fig trees shaped our history, fed our imaginations and can enrich our future' (Unbound, 2016). My book was published in the US and Canada as 'Gods, Wasps, and Stranglers: The Secret History and Redemptive Future of Fig Trees' (Chelsea Green, 2016).
Read a summary and advance praise from: Annie Proulx, Deborah Blum, Michael Pollan, Sy Montgomery, Simran Sethi, David George Haskell and others.

North American edition

UK EDITION

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