Druid Tree Workings: Finding and Working with Grandmother Trees

The Ancient Maple - An Elder of the Land
The Ancient Maple - An Elder of the Land
The Ancient Maple – Grandmother Tree.  This grandmother lives in a middle of a rock pile.  the three branching trunks signify she may have been cut at one time and regrew. Grandmothers can be stubborn!

A grandmother is a really special person. I remember going to my grandmother’s house when I was a little girl–it was literally my favorite place to go. My grandmother and I would go to the thrift store and buy used clothing, then spend the morning sewing doll clothes and repurposing those old clothes for amazing new clothes for me–skirts that swirled out wide and colorfully printed tops.  We’d go out into the garden and pick herbs, and she’d cook up an incredible pot of mushroom soup.  She was full of generosity and love and always fostered my creativity and joy.  My other grandmother was quite different–she was a bit of a firecracker, sassy and short-tempered. A steel mill worker’s wife, she knew how to make do with nothing and taught us the importance of honoring what we had and taking time for family. She nurtured her grandchildren, bringing us plates of crackers with peanut butter and butter, sitting on the porch watching us play, and simply being present.  Perhaps you have your own fond memories of your grandmothers, or you have others who have served a similar role in your life.

I start with a discussion here about human grandmothers because in talking about developing deep tree relationships, associating tree work to things we already understand can be helpful.  Today, we are going to talk about finding and honoring the “grandmother” trees that you may have encountered, those ancient wise trees that nurture and support you in similar ways to a human grandmother.This post is part of my Sacred Trees in the Americas series. In this series, I explore the magic, mythology, herbal, cultural, and divination uses, with the goal of eventually producing a larger work that explores many of our unique trees located on the US East Coast. For the methods for how I research these posts, see this page. Other trees in this series include SpicebushRhododendron, American Hazel, Witch Hazel, Staghorn Sumac, Chestnut, Cherry, Juniper, Birch, Elder, Walnut, Eastern White Cedar, Hemlock, Sugar Maple, Hawthorn, Hickory, Beech, Ash, White Pine, Black Locust, and Oak. For information on how to work with trees spiritually, you can see my Druid Tree Working series including finding the face of the tree, communicating on the outer planes, communicating on the inner planes, establishing deep connections with trees, working with urban treestree energy,  seasonal workings, and helping tree spirits pass.  This material will all be part of my forthcoming Tree Alchemy oracle project!

What are “Grandmother” Trees?

Grandmother Beech
Grandmother Beech, a nurturing soul who offered me these teachings.

I first was introduced to the concept of “Grandmother” trees by a group of ancient beech trees I had found in the forest.  I had spent two days before doing some deep and pretty painful spiritual work as part of a spiritual retreat, and the grove of ancient beeches welcomed me in and invited me to stay and rest for a few hours. The photo here is of one of these amazing grandmother beech trees. I put my blanket down in the middle of the grove of ancient grandmothers, and they nurtured me.  I dozed off, and the grandmothers appeared more human in my dream, offering me visions and tending me with their gentle hands.  They gave me the message to recall other grandmother trees and share this concept.

Grandmother trees are special trees that function in many ways similar to a human grandmother. They nurture you and feed your spirit.  They are there, welcoming and wise. These trees are usually some of the oldest trees that you meet–kind, loving trees, full of the weight of wisdom. They have the weight of centuries upon them and in their old age, they have much to share. Like a human grandmother, these trees have their own personalities–some more nurturing, some sharper, some quieter–but they are always there to give and to experience the connection with you.

The nice thing about grandmother trees is that you can have as many of them in your life as you want. Some of these trees may become a long and stabilizing presence for you, and some may come or be in your life only a short while. Either way, they are a blessing and an excellent way to cultivate deeper relationships with trees and the living earth.

Finding Your Grandmother Trees

Now that I’ve shared the concept with you, you can take this idea in a number of different directions.  Here are some options:

Identifying Your grandmother trees. The first thing you could do is think about the really meaningful trees that you’ve had interaction with that might fit this category. Create a list of those “grandmother” trees, those trees that may hold a special place for you. If you don’t yet have any grandmother trees, then skip to some of the later steps.

Interaction in spirit for those that were lost. Some of your grandmother trees may be left only in your memory.  An ancient crab apple tree was my first grandmother tree.  She was, ironically, located behind my grandmother’s house on an adjacent property that was delightfully overgrown with weeds and that was an old cider apple orchard.  When I was small, my cousins and I spent a lot of time with this tree–she had amazing branches with different “rooms” that you could climb into and it was so enjoyable to play in this tree.  We would eat her sour apples and gather them up in quantity to take to our grandmother, who would turn them into pies.  Sadly, this incredible tree was cut when I was still a child, where a neighbor decided to turn this abandoned wild orchard into a lawn. Even though this grandmother tree is gone, her memory is with me, and I return to the spot where she once grew.  I remember her, and I honor her, and the nutrients that she shared with me I carry in my bones.  Thus, it is easy to do a spirit journey to reconnect with grandmother apple and still sit at her feet and hear her wisdom.

Seek out new grandmother trees.  A grandmother tree is usually easy to spot–she’s the largest and oldest tree.  If she’s in a park, you’ll often find people congregating around her simply because they seem to want to be near her.  Or you might find one of the more remote grandmother trees, those trees that are found hidden away in forests. Here where I live in Western PA, nearly all of our forests were logged repeatedly, and thus, the oldest grandmother trees are almost always found along what was abandoned fence rows or in the middle of a rock pile (which at one time, would have been a field).  It might be that your own landscape has its own ways of finding grandmother trees.  In truth, they are not hard to find, at least not in areas with natural wood cover–just go hiking or to a nearby park and you will find them.

Working with Your Grandmother Trees

Towering White Pine, Parker Dam State Park, PA
Another amazing grandmother tree I know–a white pine! She reaches to the sky and brightens everything around her.

Find the face of the grandmother tree. Many grandmother trees, being the oldest and wisest of trees, have faces (more on face of the tree here).  If you look, you can see their amazing faces. These faces may lend you insight into the personality of this particular grandmother.  Speak to the grandmother, looking at her faces and different expressions.  Look also at her bark patterns, root patterns, and how the branches in her crown branch out.  You can learn quite a bit about this grandmother tree from these simple observations.

Build a relationship.  Like all relationships with nature, you should focus first on reciprocation and gratitude.  See if the tree is willing to communicate (these trees nearly always are, and welcome communication).  Offer gratitude and offerings.  Sit beneath your tree and look at how she grows, how her branches come in different directions.  If she is willing, sit against your tree and exchange energy, allowing her energy to flow into you and yours into her.  Play music or sing for your tree, and listen to her own song in the wind.  As you cultivate this sacred relationship, your tree may have gifts for you–a branch, a leaf, or her nuts/seeds.  She may ask you to do things or bring her things.  She may have words of wisdom for you.

Not all grandmother trees are enormous--this ancient hawthorn may grow in the understory, but she has much to teach.
Not all grandmother trees are enormous–this ancient hawthorn may grow in the understory, but she has much to teach.

And like all things, consider how your relationship is reciprocalDon’t only come when you need something–come just to spend time.  When you do, consider bringing gifts for your tree–a song, a poem, a story.  These ancient trees may be so old that they once had other such friendships over time, and they will certainly value yours.

I can’t underestimate this kind of regular interaction. Every time that I visit one of my own grandmother trees, even if it has been years (say, from a place that I moved away), I feel that both the grandmother tree and I are enriched by the experience.  And even when I can’t visit them physically, I visit them in spirit!

Learn. The most important thing you can do with these grandmother trees is open yourself up to their wisdom. Some of the oldest grandmother trees remember times before, times before colocalization and cultural genocide destroyed the land’s native peoples; times before the land was stripped bare for greed and industrialization. In their quiet voices, they will teach you: of their medicine, of their magic, and of how to relearn how to be connected to the wisdom of the landscape and tend the land.  They have more to teach you than any human possibly could, just take the time to listen.

Closing Thoughts

While the grandmother tree idea seems like a simple thing, it is an amazing way to help you cultivate deeper relationships with trees all over your landscape.  I have several trees that I am as close to as my own human friends, that I visit often, and that we share much together.  I would love to hear from you and perhaps you can share some of your own experiences with these grandmother trees and the blessings they offer!

News – The New Druidry Handbook!

Druidry Handbook – Classic Edition

As a final note, I’m excited to announce that I’ve written the new forward to Weiser Classics edition of The Druidry Handbook by John Michael Greer.  I am honored to be asked to write the introduction and share how much The Druidry Handbook and Greer’s work have shaped my own druid practice.  It is now available so I hope that you’ll check it out!

Dana O'Driscoll

Dana O’Driscoll has been an animist druid for 20 years, and currently serves as Grand Archdruid in the Ancient Order of Druids in America (www.aoda.org). She is a druid-grade member of the Order of Bards, Ovates, and Druids and is the OBOD’s 2018 Mount Haemus Scholar. She is the author of Sacred Actions: Living the Wheel of the Year through Earth-Centered Spiritual Practice (REDFeather, 2021), the Sacred Actions Journal (REDFeather, 2022), and Land Healing: Physical, Metaphysical, and Ritual Approaches for Healing the Earth (REDFeather, 2024). She is also the author/illustrator of the Tarot of Trees, Plant Spirit Oracle, and Treelore Oracle. Dana is an herbalist, certified permaculture designer, and permaculture teacher who teaches about reconnection, regeneration, and land healing through herbalism, wild food foraging, and sustainable living. In 2024, she co-founded the Pennsylvania School of Herbalism with her sister and fellow herbalist, Briel Beaty. Dana lives at a 5-acre homestead in rural western Pennsylvania with her partner and a host of feathered and furred friends. She writes at the Druids Garden blog and is on Instagram as @druidsgardenart. She also regularly writes for Plant Healer Quarterly and Spirituality and Health magazine.

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18 Comments

  1. Reblogged this on Blue Dragon Journal.

    1. Thank you for the reblog!

    1. Thank you for the reblog!

  2. Jesse-Blue Forrest

    We work with grandfather trees…here on Turtle Island

    Shennen Kowa – Great Peace,

    Mitakuye Oyasin, – We Are All Related

    Jesse-Blue Walking Thunder >:

    1. Hello Jesse-Blue Walking Thunder, thank you so much for your comment. I would love to hear more about how you work with the grandfather trees. Blessings!

  3. Hello,

    I just wish to extend my gratitude for your Postings/ Blog. They always open up the realm of Druidry, which I am new to, so nicely. Particularly your focus on N. American Trees, which I appreciate greatly.

    I am of Metis( French Indian) orgin, from Booneville NY, with Haudenosaunee Kanien’keha-Mo hawk ancestry.I was a foster kid, given up in infancy by my Mother. I am Two Spirit, married to my Spouse for 21yrs.

    Now in my late 50s, finding much inspiration and soul medicine in the little bits of Druidry I am studying, mainly on your Blog and some OBOD resources.

    Just wanted to say thank you for your teachings and the good Medicine you share.

    Nia’wen Kowa. Thank you good friend 🍂🌲🐻

    1. Hello Thomas, thank you so much for your comment. I’m glad that you are finding the blog posts helpful! I have met a number of people of Native American ancestry who are turning to druidry to find reconnection with nature when their own ancestral knowledge was lost. I wish you blessings on the path! :).

  4. Hi Dana, thank you for sharing the spirit of trees with me. Indigenous Indians too had deep respect for the generative spirit of trees. However, there is one tree — the oldest and wisest in the field where the beast dwells; its fruit is fatal to mankind. Do you remember that tree? Please reply to me and join me in exposing the true purpose of that tree, and discover how we may let our agreement provide life’s remedy to mankind’s poisoned state-of-mind. With blessings from the Tree-of-Life, Peter

    1. Hi Peter, I think that humanity’s poisoned state of mind has a lot to do with our own creations and choices and not from any tree–but that’s just my perspective. Blessings to you and thanks as always for your comment!

  5. Hi Dana ,
    I have a Grandmother Apple tree in our backyard . She is very old & unique. The front of her is hollow and the back is solid .I believe this tree is older than 50 yrs old . I always offer her gifts of fruit or corn in the winter . She holds the wind chime I bought this winter after my most precious black cat – Spooky, he passed on in December and I was “told” to bury Spooky in front of her so she would watch over him . I love this tree and admire her . She reminds me of me . I was in an collision in 2002 and even though I wasn’t severely hurt on the outside , I suffered muscular skeletal issues & severe depression along with PTSD . I would always say she represents me, I may have issues, but I remain strong like her . I was so thrilled when I saw this article & read it . Thank you for writing it & confirming what I’ve known about grandmother for a longtime

    1. I love this story, Sue! What a wonderful grandmother tree that you describe. It sounds like you have both been through much together. Blessings!

  6. This is a fantastic piece of synchronicity for me! I’m a new Druid, working through the Dolmen Arch on my own. I went to the woods behind my house when I first started and asked if any trees would be willing to talk to me. Beith, a white oak, shook her branches strongly right away! (There was no wind) She introduced herself to me as a grandmother tree and showed me her face – and all this was before I found your blog. Once I found your writing, I felt so thrilled! Thank you for your writing.

    1. Haha, I love it! I think the trees are really starting to awaken after their long slumber. The fact that more than one of us are getting similar messages is a great sign. Thank you for reading, Erika, and I wish you joy on your new druid journey! (The Dolmen Arch is great!)

  7. […] Druid Tree Workings: Finding and Working with Grandmother Trees — The Druid’s Garden […]

  8. I am going today to visit an enormous old oak tree I found recently. The thing is, I got more of a male vibe from this tree. Should i call it a Grandfather tree?

  9. I love all of your posts on working with trees! I’d really like to learn more – can you recommend any books or other resources?
    Thank you!

    1. Thank you! You can check out my Magical Compendium of Eastern North American Trees :).
      https://www.etsy.com/listing/1286728939/magical-compendium-of-eastern-north

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