The character 树 (shù) means "tree", and is itself a complex character that pictorially represents a growing plant with roots, trunk, and branches. The character 林 (lín) means "forest" or "grove", and is formed by simply doubling the basic character for "wood" or "tree" (木 mù), visually creating the idea of many trees together. Therefore, the word 树林 is formed by combining the specific idea of a "tree" with the collective idea of a "forest", resulting in a compound that visually and conceptually represents a gathering or collection of trees, essentially meaning "a wood" or "a grove".