Are you looking for tree quotes, or tree captions for photos? This list of one hundred beautiful quotes about trees will inspire, motivate, and put a smile on your face.
Awe-inspiring tree facts
Trees are a powerful source of awe and wonder – and they’re also an absolutely vital part of our natural world. Before we dive into the tree quotes, check out these amazing tree facts.
- Trees have been around on Earth for at least 370 million years.
- Trees turn carbon dioxide into oxygen, which is why they are often described as the lungs of the planet.
- Some types of tree can live for thousands of years.
- Trees provide food, shelter, fuel and building materials.
- There are over 60,000 species of trees on our planet.
- There are 422 times more trees on earth than there are people.
- Leaves are lots of colours, including red, yellow, purple and orange, not just green. Chlorophyll makes leaves green and dominates until they get less sunshine, when the other colours start to take over.
- Trees work together to ward off predators. They release chemical signals to deter pests, warn other trees about a threat, and attract predators that feed on the pests.
- Trees communicate with each other via an underground network of soil fungi, sending nutrients, water and unused carbon to each other.
- Trees release chemicals called phytoncides. Research has shown that when we breathe these in, they can reduce blood pressure, lower anxiety levels and make us feel happier. All great reasons to have a go at forest bathing!
When you think about just how amazing trees are, it’s no surprise that they have inspired so many tree quotes and tree proverbs, is it?
Whether you’d like to find trees quotes that uplift you, a tree caption for your nature photography, or simply enjoy some beautiful quotes on trees, this is the perfect resource.
The best tree quotes, forest quotes and tree captions
I’ve put together one hundred fantastic tree quotes and tree captions to help you find the perfect words of wisdom.
There are inspiring quotes about trees, beautiful trees quotes, spiritual quotes about trees, quotes about the forest, tree quotes with a life and love theme, funny tree quotes, quotes about tree conservation, and quotes about planting trees. I’ve also included some great tree proverbs that will get you thinking. It really is a bumper list!
Make sure you bookmark this post, so you’ve got a handy reference for your photos, social media posts and daily dose of inspiration. And if you’re looking for tree quotes for instagram, my nature hashtags copy & paste lists will save you even more time – they’re perfect for your other nature pictures too.
Inspirational tree quotes
“Trees are the earth’s endless effort to speak to the listening heaven.” – Rabindranath Tagore
“For a tree to become tall it must grow tough roots among the rocks.” – Friedrich Nietzsche
“You can’t have the fruits without the roots.” – Stephen Covey
“Solitary trees, if they grow at all, grow strong.” – Winston Churchill
“Unless a tree has borne blossoms in spring, you will vainly look for fruit on it in autumn.” – Walter Scott
“A woodland in full colour is awesome as a forest fire, in magnitude at least, but a single tree is like a dancing tongue of flame to warm the heart.” – Hal Borland
“The trees that are slow to grow bear the best fruit.” – Molière
“Between every two pines is a doorway to a new world.” – John Muir
“I like to think of thoughts as living blossoms borne by the human tree.” – James Douglas
“There is always music amongst the trees in the garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it.” – Minnie Aumonier
“Time spent amongst trees is never wasted time.” – Katrina Mayer
“Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.” – Abraham Lincoln
“This solitary Tree! a living thing produced too slowly ever to decay; of form and aspect too magnificent to be destroyed.” – William Wordsworth
“Of the infinite variety of fruits which spring from the bosom of the earth, the trees of the wood are the greatest in dignity.” – Susan Fenimore Cooper
“And see the peaceful trees extend their myriad leaves in leisured dance—they bear the weight of sky and cloud upon the fountain of their veins.” – Kathleen Raine
Quotes on the beauty of trees
“Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky.” – Kahlil Gibran
“For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.” – Martin Luther
“Of all man’s works of art, a cathedral is greatest. A vast and majestic tree is greater than that.” – Henry Ward Beecher
“I feel a great regard for trees; they represent age and beauty and the miracles of life and growth.” – Louise Dickinson Rich
“Trees are your best antiques.” – Alexander Smith
“How beautiful leaves grow old. How full of light and colour are their last days.” – John Burrough
“Never say there is nothing beautiful in the world anymore. There is always something to make you wonder in the shape of a tree, the trembling of a leaf.” –Albert Schweitzer
Spiritual trees quotes
“Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.” – Hermann Hesse
“Trees give peace to the souls of men.” – Nora Waln
“We’re merely one tree with various types, shapes and sizes of leaves that all wave differently in the breeze.” – Rasheed Ogunlaru
“To be without trees would, in the most literal way, to be without our roots.” – Richard Mabey
“The tree is more than first a seed, then a stem, then a living trunk, and then dead timber. The tree is a slow, enduring force straining to win the sky.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
“Look at a tree, a plant. How still they are, how deeply rooted in being. Allow nature to teach you stillness.” – Eckhart Tolle
“The green oak and cedar – the dark pine, the yellow and silvery-barked willow – each majestic old tree; hath its own peculiar tone and whisper for thine ear.” – Elizabeth J. Eames
“All our wisdom is stored in the trees.” – Santosh Kalwar
Forest quotes
“And into the forest I go, to lose my mind and find my soul.” – John Muir
“It is not so much for its beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men’s hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air, that emanation from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit.” – Robert Louis Stevenson
“The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
“What we are doing to the forests of the world is but a mirror reflection of what we are doing to ourselves and to one another.” – Mahatma Gandhi
“The clearest way into the universe is through a forest wilderness.” – John Muir
“The strongest oak of the forest is not the one that is protected from the storm and hidden from the sun. It’s the one that stands in the open where it is compelled to struggle for its existence against the winds and rains and the scorching sun.” – Napoleon Hill
“A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt
“The forest makes your heart gentle. You become one with it… No place for greed or anger there.” – Pha Pachak
“Come to the woods, for here is rest.” – John Muir
“A forest of these trees is a spectacle too much for one man to see.” – David Douglas
“I took a walk in the woods and came out taller than the trees.” – Henry David Thoreau
Tree quotes about life
“We can learn a lot from trees: they’re always grounded but never stop reaching heavenward.” – Everett Mámor
“Be like a tree. The tree gives shade even to him who cuts off its boughs.” – Sri Chaitanya
“In a forest of a hundred thousand trees, no two leaves are alike. And no two journeys along the same path are alike.” – Paulo Coelho
“If you would know strength and patience, welcome the company of trees.” – Hal Borland
“The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.” – Nelson Henderson
“Storms make trees take deeper roots.” – Dolly Parton
“A tree has roots in the soil yet reaches to the sky. It tells us that in order to aspire we need to be grounded and that no matter how high we go it is from our roots that we draw sustenance.” – Wangari Maathai
“I think of trees as my extended family, living, breathing and social, like us.” – Dame Judi Dench
“Learn character from trees, values from roots, and change from leaves.” – Tasneem Hameed
“Live like a tree, giving, forgiving and free.” – Debasish Mridha M.D.
Love themed quotes about a tree
“Love is a tree; and lovers are its shade.” – Rumi
“Life without love is like a tree without blossom and fruit.” – Khalil Gibran
“Love is like a tree, it grows of its own accord, it puts down deep roots into our whole being.” – Victor Hugo
“Trees indeed have hearts.” – Henry David Thoreau
Funny trees quotes
“Have you ever considered that paper cuts are a tree’s last revenge?” – Unknown
“I looked up my family tree and found out I was the sap.” – Rodney Dangerfield
“Every family tree produces some lemons, some nuts and a few bad apples.” – Unknown
“Some people are like trees – they take forever to grow up.” – Leslie Hillman
Quotes on tree conservation
“Ancient trees are precious. There is little else on Earth that plays host to such a rich community of life within a single living organism.” – Sir David Attenborough
“People who will not sustain trees will soon live in a world that will not sustain people.“ – Bryce Nelson
“Every living creature should be grateful to every living tree for giving us a habitable world!” – Mehmet Murat ildan
“Every leaf speaks bliss to me, fluttering from the autumn tree.” – Emily Brontë
“To exist as a nation, to prosper as a state, to live as a people, we must have trees.” – Theodore Roosevelt
“When we plant a tree, we are doing what we can to make our planet a more wholesome and happier dwelling-place for those who come after us if not for ourselves.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes
“At first I thought I was fighting to save rubber trees, then I thought I was fighting to save the Amazon rainforest. Now I realise I am fighting for humanity.” – Chico Mendes
“Trees exhale for us so that we can inhale them to stay alive. Can we ever forget that? Let us love trees with every breath we take until we perish.” – Munia Khan
Plant a tree quotes
“He that plants trees, loves others besides himself.” – Thomas Fuller
“Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” – Warren Buffett
“A man doesn’t plant a tree for himself. He plants it for posterity.” – Alexander Smith
“Acts of creation are ordinarily reserved for gods and poets, but humbler folk may circumvent this restriction if they know how. To plant a pine, for example, one need be neither god nor poet; one need only own a shovel.” – Aldo Leopold
“Trees are the best monuments that a man can erect to his own memory. They speak his praises without flattery, and they are blessings to children yet unborn.” – Lord Orrery
“He who plants a tree, plants a hope.” – Lucy Larcom
“Until you dig a hole, you plant a tree, you water it and make it survive, you haven’t done a thing. You are just talking.” – Wangari Maathai
“Reversing deforestation is complicated; planting a tree is simple.” – Martin O’Malley
“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.” – Martin Luther
Tree proverbs & tree sayings
Proverbs are great conversation starters, and a nice way to get kids thinking. As you can probably imagine, there’s a whole host of tree proverbs out there – here are my favourites.
Even the best tree sometimes has bad fruit. – Hungarian proverb
In a tree that you can’t climb, there are always a thousand fruits. – Indian proverb
If you want to be happy for a year, plant a garden; if you want to be happy for life, plant a tree. – English proverb
Men will only throw stones at trees that are laden with fruit. – French proverb
Little strokes fell great oaks. – American proverb
A tree falls the way it leans. – Bulgarian proverb
A tree does not move unless there is wind. – Afghan Proverb
Don’t climb a tree to catch a fish. – Chinese proverb
A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. – Greek proverb
Big trees cast more shadow than fruit. – German proverb
If a dead tree falls, it carries with it a live one. – Kenyan proverb
The firm tree does not fear the storm. – Indonesian proverb
The taller the tree, the harder the fall. – Dutch proverb
Though a tree grows ever so high, the falling leaves return to its roots. – Malawian proverb
The best trees grow on the steepest hills. – Burundi proverb
The one who plants the tree is not the one who will enjoy its shade. – Chinese proverb
An apple never falls far from the tree. – English proverb
When eating the fruit, think of the person who planted the tree. – Vietnamese proverb
The tree of silence bears the fruits of peace. – Arabian proverb
Keep a green tree in your heart and perhaps a singing bird will come. – Chinese proverb
A seed hidden in the heart of an apple is an orchard invisible. – Welsh proverb
Mighty oaks from little acorns grow. – English proverb
The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The next best time is now. – Chinese proverb
More inspirational quotes about trees
For even more tree quotes – and some inspiring tree images – take a look at this short video.
What’s your favourite tree quote?
I hope these tree quotes, forest quotes and trees sayings have inspired you and given you a little dose of the wonder of nature. If you’ve got a favourite quote about a tree that you think I need to add to this list, let me know in the comments 🙂
More inspiring nature quotes and jokes
For more lovely quotes with a nature theme, you might like to take a look at my posts on nature quotes and garden quotes.
I’ve also got a whole series of posts on nature-inspired jokes and puns that are great for a giggle – they make fab captions for your nature photos on social media too. There are tree jokes, garden jokes, flower jokes, bee jokes, fruit jokes and pumpkin jokes (this last one is particularly good around Halloween).
More nature inspiration
If you love exploring nature and would like some more inspiration, there are lots of ideas in the nature and craft sections of the blog. And finally, my book ‘A Year of Nature Craft & Play’ is packed with fun nature-themed activities, games and crafts for kids.
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