Have you seen a salmon in a tree? In America’s rain forest, the wild salmon provide nutrients for the trees, which in turn support the streams where the salmon thrive. Scientists have even found salmon DNA inside trees! If you’ve just had an A-ha! moment, pass it on by hanging a salmon in a tree near you! Download the instructions.

Our Tongass: A place where trees grow salmon, salmon grow trees, and a rich cycle of life carries on through millennia

One of the rarest ecosystems on Earth, the Tongass rain forest fringes the coastal panhandle of Alaska and covers thousands of islands in the Alexander Archipelago. It’s a place where everything is interconnected: Humpback whales, orcas, and sea lions cruise the forested shorelines. Wild salmon swim upstream into the forest, feeding some of the world’s highest densities of grizzlies, black bears, and bald eagles. Native cultures endure with Raven, Eagle, and Salmon. Local communities benefit from the gifts of both the forest and sea.

Salmon in the Trees is a visually stunning book that gives shape—and voice—to one of North America’s richest natural treasures. —John Vaillant, author of The Golden Spruce: A True Story of Myth, Madness, and Greed

But the global demands of our modern world may threaten this great forest’s biological treasures. Salmon in the Trees: Life in Alaska’s Tongass Rain Forest fully explores the entire ecosystem of the Tongass National Forest—its habitat, wildlife, and people. Here, millions of wild salmon are the crucial link between the forest and the sea, and shape both animal and human lives. With camera and rain gear in hand, photographer Amy Gulick spent more than two years trekking and paddling among the bears, misty islands, and salmon streams to document the intricate connections within the Tongass. Along the way, she met Alaskans—bush pilots, fishermen, guides, artists—who call the Tongass home.

Together with engaging and accessible essays from renowned conservationists, scientists, and journalists, as well as salmon-spawned illustrations from artist Ray Troll, Gulick portrays a hopeful story of a magnificent—and intact—ecosystem where trees still grow salmon, and salmon still grow trees.

• Order your copy of Salmon in the Trees today

More information

Amy Gulick is an award-winning photojournalist and a Fellow with the International League of Conservation Photographers. Her images and stories have been featured in Audubon, National Wildlife, Nature’s Best Photography, and Sierra. To see more of her work, visit www.amygulick.com. To learn more about Amy’s work in the Tongass, visit www.salmoninthetrees.org. Salmon in the Trees is produced by Braided River, the conservation imprint of The Mountaineers Books. See www.braidedriver.org.

Amy Gulick is Alaska Wilderness League’s 2010 Voice of the Wild Award winner. Read Amy’s acceptance speech here.

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