Scientists Intrigued by Tree That Harnesses Electricity to Kill Its Enemies
But the opposite appears to be the case for the towering tonka bean tree (Dipteryx oleifera), a native of the rainforests of Panama that grows up to 130 feet tall and lives for hundreds of years.
Lightning is a weapon in its arsenal, and it wields it masterfully. When an opportune lightning strike comes, the tonka tree survives unscathed — while clinging-on parasites and its competing neighbors are vanquished, according to a recent study published in the journal New Phytologist.
"We started doing this work 10 years ago, and it became really apparent that lightning kills a lot of trees, especially a lot of very big trees," lead author Evan Gora, a forest ecologist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies, told Live Science. "But Dipteryx oleifera consistently showed no damage."
The work explores how lightning shapes forests and the lives of the trees that inhabit them. Compared to other causes of tree mortality, like drought and fire, which are known to have crucial roles in maintaining a healthy ecosystem, lightning's positive influence is largely understudied, according to the researchers.
To dig in, the researchers created a system to pinpoint lightning strikes in Panama's Barro Colorado Nature Monument, using an antenna array and an ensemble of drones. Combined with four decades of tree plot records of the extensively studied rainforest, the researchers were able to form a clear picture of how lightning affected the specific areas that it struck.
In all, between 2014 and 2019, the researchers documented nearly 100 instances of various species of trees being directly struck by lightning. More than half of these trees were killed. But strikingly — pun intended — all ten tonka bean trees that were hit by the powerful electric discharges survived, showing negligible damage.
The same could not be said for the tonka bean trees' parasites, a species of woody vine known as lianas: 78 percent of them were wiped out by the lightning purges. And woe befell the neighbors, too, with over two metric tons of competing trees' biomass annihilated in each strike.
"There's a quantifiable, detectable hazard of living next to Dipteryx oleifera," Gora told Live Science. "[As a tree], you are substantially more likely to die than living next to any other big old large tree in that forest."
As tonka bean trees can live for centuries, the researchers estimate that on average, one will be struck at least five times over its lifespan, providing substantial benefits that rise above mere fluke. In fact, with a height some 30 percent taller and a crown 50 percent wider than others, it seemingly dares the heavens above to unleash their fury. Relative to trees with a trunk of similar diameter, the researchers found, the tonka bean tree boasted 68 percent higher odds of being struck by lightning.
"It seems to have an architecture that is potentially selecting to be struck more often," Gora told the New York Times.
And so, virtually bending lightning to its will to take care of its enemies, the tonka bean trees see a fourteen times boost to their fecundity — a stunning reproductive advantage.
More on nature: Behold This Bonkers Photo of a 2,800-Pound Rhino Dangling Upside Down From a Helicopter
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