Hello. My name is Rachel and I work in the promotions department at BTCV headquarters in Doncaster. This is my first blog but I thought I'd share a few thoughts with you!
There's nothing at Christmas I love more than having a nice big fir tree in the front room - all decorated, it's just beautiful.
It's not a Christmas tree if it's not real.
But even thought it's beautiful I always get a guilty feeling knowing that this tree has been cut down.
So this year I have decided that I am going to plant a new tree to replace the one that has been cut down.
If anyone feels the same then why not join BTCV this Christmas and New Year.
It's a great way to kick that guilty feeling and give back to the environment. There really is no better time to get involved.
Visit www.btcv.org for details of your nearest volunteering opportunity.
For those living in Yorkshire there's lots of tree planting opportunities with the White Rose Forest. BTCV has been busy with this project in Wakefield for some time. Visit http://www.whiteroseforest.org.uk/
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Monday, December 13, 2010
Blackthorn, Hawthorn and Rowan: Three Romantic English Trees
It's tree talk time again, time to identify a few more trees which Carbon Army 3 will be planting over these next weeks for our intensive tree planting campaign.
We'll look at Blackthorn, Hawthorn and Rowan this week, their names sounding of poetry and novels, and though they do sound quite similar, but are they?
To start with Blackthorn, Prunus spinosa, a deciduous, much branched shrub, quite smallish, growing only up to 5 metres, and famed for its sloe berries used to make jam and sloe gin.
It is found in lowland woodland margins, scrub and hedgerows, banks and bogs, on a wide range of soils. The green leaves are alternate and elliptic, the stems are dark to blackish, dense and thick with thorns in amongst the stalks, twisting and branching out in all directions. The white flowers give way to the fruit, similar to small plums that become the blue-black 'sloes' which are ripe in autumn.
The low-growing thorny bush makes an excellent protected site for shy nesting birds such as the nightingale, the leaves feed the caterpillars of brown and black hairstreak butterflies.
The Hawthorn is from the rose family, Rosaceae, growing as either a shrub or a tree, with white flowers and many thorns. It is broad and low, getting only 5–14 metres tall with trunk or stems of hard wood, ash-gray bark and thorny branches. The small, shiny leaves are dark green on top, lighter underneath, and have three irregularly toothed lobes, the white flowers have round petals and the fruit are large bright red berries, resembling a rosy miniature apple.
Hawthorns provide food and shelter for many species of birds and mammals, and the sweet smelling flowers are important for many nectar-feeding insects.
Like the Hawthorn, the Rowan tree is from the rose family, also deciduous, and generally a small and slender tree, reaching about 10-20 metres. However, Rowan have no thorns and grow in higher, more mountainous areas, the greyish-brown bark is smooth, and the leaves are made up of matched pairs of leaflets on either side of a stem with a leaflet at the top, the flowers again white, and berries bright red, growing in clumps.
Rowan is a good host tree for lichens, and the foliage is preferred by many different browsing animals, especially red deer and mountain hares feed on the plant, and many birds feed on the berries.
So there are three more magnificent trees to go out and spot on your walks through the countryside, something to take your mind off the chill in the air!
More very soon --Elaine
It's tree talk time again, time to identify a few more trees which Carbon Army 3 will be planting over these next weeks for our intensive tree planting campaign.
We'll look at Blackthorn, Hawthorn and Rowan this week, their names sounding of poetry and novels, and though they do sound quite similar, but are they?
To start with Blackthorn, Prunus spinosa, a deciduous, much branched shrub, quite smallish, growing only up to 5 metres, and famed for its sloe berries used to make jam and sloe gin.
It is found in lowland woodland margins, scrub and hedgerows, banks and bogs, on a wide range of soils. The green leaves are alternate and elliptic, the stems are dark to blackish, dense and thick with thorns in amongst the stalks, twisting and branching out in all directions. The white flowers give way to the fruit, similar to small plums that become the blue-black 'sloes' which are ripe in autumn.
The low-growing thorny bush makes an excellent protected site for shy nesting birds such as the nightingale, the leaves feed the caterpillars of brown and black hairstreak butterflies.
The Hawthorn is from the rose family, Rosaceae, growing as either a shrub or a tree, with white flowers and many thorns. It is broad and low, getting only 5–14 metres tall with trunk or stems of hard wood, ash-gray bark and thorny branches. The small, shiny leaves are dark green on top, lighter underneath, and have three irregularly toothed lobes, the white flowers have round petals and the fruit are large bright red berries, resembling a rosy miniature apple.
Hawthorns provide food and shelter for many species of birds and mammals, and the sweet smelling flowers are important for many nectar-feeding insects.
Like the Hawthorn, the Rowan tree is from the rose family, also deciduous, and generally a small and slender tree, reaching about 10-20 metres. However, Rowan have no thorns and grow in higher, more mountainous areas, the greyish-brown bark is smooth, and the leaves are made up of matched pairs of leaflets on either side of a stem with a leaflet at the top, the flowers again white, and berries bright red, growing in clumps.
Rowan is a good host tree for lichens, and the foliage is preferred by many different browsing animals, especially red deer and mountain hares feed on the plant, and many birds feed on the berries.
So there are three more magnificent trees to go out and spot on your walks through the countryside, something to take your mind off the chill in the air!
More very soon --Elaine
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Grim's Ditch Carbon Army Action
1000 NEW TREES -
IN GRIM'S DITCH FOR CARBON ARMY 3
By your favourite BTCV blogger Elaine !
By your favourite BTCV blogger Elaine !
I went out last week with the London Biodiversity Action Team (BAT), to a very interestingly titled woodland, Grim's Ditch, over in Harrow. It is the site of a linear earthwork that is thought to date from the Saxon period, "grim" being the Saxon word for devil or goblin, it served as a boundary marker, and is one of the few remaining Anglo-Saxon trenches in England. Grim's Ditch is under threat from motorcycle scrambling and illegal rubbish dumping, but as an important part of Harrow's heritage, it is essential that it is preserved.
We arrived in good time at about 10am from London, piling out of the mini van and unloading our equipment. We saw frost on the rooftops where we parked, and the cold air was a noticeable few degrees colder than in London. I started to feel a bit hesitant and I was wondering if I had dressed warmly enough to survive the day outside. However, as we walked along the dirt path covered with oak leaves into the woods, it felt great to be out in the fresh air, and on reaching our spot, we then warmed up with a nice cup of tea.
We were to continue removing all the Cherry Laurel and thereby make way for 1000 new trees to be planted as part of Carbon Army Phase 3 campaign. The 1000 trees we will be planting there are native species; 100 Field Maple, 400 Hawthorn, 200 Hazel, 150 Blackthorn, 100 Dogwood and 50 Spindle. It will be quite exciting to see all the newly planted trees once they are put in.
Cherry Laurel is a very pretty, exotic looking plant, with long elliptical, dark green shiny leaves, but it is an invasive species that is taking over the area, killing off the heather understorey and other native shrubs. It grows rapidly, with a lot of low lying leafy shrub and vines, easily tolerating drought and shade, so it often out-competes and kills off native plant species.
We had a quick walk around the wood, looking for the sinister Cherry Laurel, and then all we dug in; I grabbed a pair of loppers and went off to begin attacking the Laurel. It was easy to spot, however, once I started on a plant I found it had pervaded everywhere, it's vines and shoots insinuating itself all around. It was easy to lop off as it was rather soft wood, and the roots came up fairly easily as well. With all the lopping, sawing, pruning and felling, I was almost a bit too warm; certainly the cold was kept well at bay.
We broke for lunch and when we came back I started on a large Laurel tree, much bigger than I thought I was capable of removing. But bit by bit, branch by branch, vine by vine, the whole area came clean, with just a trunk with some far overhead branches left to be removed. That would be for next time, as the sun was starting to indicate it was heading on its way down.
We started packing up, my back and hands a bit achy, but I was comfortably tired and very satisfied. There was a very large oak tree just near us, with one of its immense lower lying branches having fallen off right next to it, a branch as big as a large tree itself. We counted about 100 rings on the branch, so the oak should be somewhere over 100 years old, massive and mighty, and hopefully living on many hundred more.
More from me soon. Enjoy the trees - it's National Tree Week!
For more details see Grims Ditch Woodland
We arrived in good time at about 10am from London, piling out of the mini van and unloading our equipment. We saw frost on the rooftops where we parked, and the cold air was a noticeable few degrees colder than in London. I started to feel a bit hesitant and I was wondering if I had dressed warmly enough to survive the day outside. However, as we walked along the dirt path covered with oak leaves into the woods, it felt great to be out in the fresh air, and on reaching our spot, we then warmed up with a nice cup of tea.
We were to continue removing all the Cherry Laurel and thereby make way for 1000 new trees to be planted as part of Carbon Army Phase 3 campaign. The 1000 trees we will be planting there are native species; 100 Field Maple, 400 Hawthorn, 200 Hazel, 150 Blackthorn, 100 Dogwood and 50 Spindle. It will be quite exciting to see all the newly planted trees once they are put in.
Cherry Laurel is a very pretty, exotic looking plant, with long elliptical, dark green shiny leaves, but it is an invasive species that is taking over the area, killing off the heather understorey and other native shrubs. It grows rapidly, with a lot of low lying leafy shrub and vines, easily tolerating drought and shade, so it often out-competes and kills off native plant species.
We had a quick walk around the wood, looking for the sinister Cherry Laurel, and then all we dug in; I grabbed a pair of loppers and went off to begin attacking the Laurel. It was easy to spot, however, once I started on a plant I found it had pervaded everywhere, it's vines and shoots insinuating itself all around. It was easy to lop off as it was rather soft wood, and the roots came up fairly easily as well. With all the lopping, sawing, pruning and felling, I was almost a bit too warm; certainly the cold was kept well at bay.
We broke for lunch and when we came back I started on a large Laurel tree, much bigger than I thought I was capable of removing. But bit by bit, branch by branch, vine by vine, the whole area came clean, with just a trunk with some far overhead branches left to be removed. That would be for next time, as the sun was starting to indicate it was heading on its way down.
We started packing up, my back and hands a bit achy, but I was comfortably tired and very satisfied. There was a very large oak tree just near us, with one of its immense lower lying branches having fallen off right next to it, a branch as big as a large tree itself. We counted about 100 rings on the branch, so the oak should be somewhere over 100 years old, massive and mighty, and hopefully living on many hundred more.
More from me soon. Enjoy the trees - it's National Tree Week!
For more details see Grims Ditch Woodland
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