The Poplar Village

The poplar village is going to be like no other. Firstly you won’t be able to outright tell if it’s a village or not. By this I mean the village should be hidden in the trees. The village will look nearly identical to a regular forest but with a very dense spot of trees. in those trees will be 5-9 small villager homes. To get into the village there will be a ladder in between 3 tree trunks to make it as hidden as possible. The only question is what are they hiding from?