The Eighth Continent is burning!

The Eighth Continent is on fire!

From Min Barklin and the Silver Radants

Min stopped mid-sentence as a nightmare vision raced through her mind of gigantic flames ripping through the tops of trees.

She gripped Prini’s hand.

‘Prini, the canopies everywhere. The Eighth Continent, it’s on…’

‘What are you on about now?’ Galine interrupted.

‘The Eighth Continent. You know, the one where half of all the beings on the Great Orb live. It’s on fire. What’s happening to them?’ Min cried.

The Eighth Continent

In Min’s world, the Eighth Continent is the living roof of her species’ world—the woven web of forest canopies.

In ours, it’s not fiction. Earth’s forests form a vast green continent of their own, home to more than half of all land-based species. Trees are also one of our greatest climate allies. The world’s forests absorb billions of tonnes of CO₂ every year.

Which brings me to my own tiny corner of the Eighth Continent: our backyard maple.

Every spring it drops a generation of winged seeds. Ten or so sprout and I transplant them into pots, ready for anyone prepared to nurture them into a fully grown tree.

On average, dependant on species, a mature tree can absorb around 20–25 kg of CO₂ a year.

If all ten of my seedlings reach adulthood, they could draw down around 200–250 kg of CO₂ each a year.

That’s no mean feat for ten tiny maples. Not enough to solve climate change, sure. But multiply that across millions of gardens, streets, farms and forests, and the number has a more powerful impact.

We need massive global efforts to restore and protect forests. We also need the quiet, local work of tree-tenders: the people who water saplings, advocate for street trees, or simply refuse to let a seedling die in its pot.

Because every living tree is one small, green refusal to let the Eighth Continent burn.

GET DIRTY

SAD FACT: The rate of loss of primary forest may be slowing in some regions, but we have still lost vast areas of forest globally—an area equivalent to hundreds of thousands of square miles. Protecting, restoring and growing trees remains a major contribution to climate mitigation and biodiversity.

GLAD FACT:The global movement to conserve, restore and grow a trillion trees aims to bring large-scale impact, especially through The Trillion Tree Project. Some estimates suggest that restoring up to a trillion trees could capture between 488-1,012 billion tonnes (i.e., 0.488-1.012 trillion tonnes) of CO₂ over their lifetimes.

INTERESTING FACT: A carbon sink is anything that absorbs more carbon from the atmosphere than it releases. Forests, soils and oceans are the planet’s largest natural carbon sinks. Healthy forests lock away carbon in their wood, leaves, roots and soil — sometimes for centuries.