Oh, Oracle of SDMB, please help this poor supplicant find a story that is but vaguely remembered.
Humans discover that the trees on an alien planet are intelligent, and communicate with each other by changing their leaf color. It’s slow talk, but faster than just the seasonal change we see in Earth trees. As I recall the intelligent trees called themselves Hlutur. One of them gets transplanted to Earth to be their ambassador. It does help with some human and Earth problems, lives a long time, tries to talk with the Earth trees to no avail. After many years, it is dying of old age, and asks to be transplanted back to its home world. The humans do that, and its last moments are in the forests of its home world, surrounded by its fellows, in a gentle snow.
My Google-fu is weak. “Hlutur” is a legitimate Icelandic word, so that’s what turns up. I could not find it in the ISFDB. The story would have been in Analog or F&SF in the late 1970s or early 1980s.
Any ideas? Or did I hug too many trees in my youth?
Thank you!
