News from the world of trees 2017 #4

Here is another selection of tree news articles from around the world. Click on each of the pictures if you would like to read the full stories.

Thames garden bridge scrapped by Sadiq Khan

Common sense has prevailed over London’s idealistic Garden Bridge plan and £37m of public money must be repaid, says Oliver Wainwright for the Guardian…

Apple buys up all the trees

Apple is buying so many trees for its new campus in California that there aren’t enough for anyone else, says Quartz…

Read Full Post »

Beside the River Ebbw

A footpath beside the River Ebbw in Maesglas

Here are my pictures from a lovely little lunchtime walk on a sunny April day beside the River Ebbw in Maesglas, on the western side of Newport. For those to whom the spelling looks strange, the letter W is a vowel in Welsh, so Ebbw is pronounced Ebb-oo.

The river’s two main tributaries – Ebbw Fawr (“big”) and Ebbw Fach (“small”) – rise in the Brecon Beacons. I’d better also mention that in Welsh the letter F sounds like the English V! The Fawr flows down the valley headed by Ebbw Vale while the Fach flows down the valley to the east headed by Brynmawr.

Read Full Post »

Remembered roses

Some of the flowers given to me by colleagues at Media Wales when I ‘retired’ in October 2015

God gave us memory so that we might have roses in December…
I read that line in a Reader’s Digest many decades ago – it is usually attributed to J M Barrie, the author of Peter Pan.

This is my 500th blog post, but don’t get too excited! I’m afraid I have no giveaway or special offer for you. I’m not even going to do a roundup this time, although you may find some of my favourites in my Blog post 300 and counting.

I’m afraid this post is just me reflecting on my “real” life outside blogging, so don’t feel obliged to read it! It has been brewing for a long time – ever since I first “retired” from my journalism “job for life” 18 months ago.

Read Full Post »

2017 tree following 3: Green leaves and fruits

The avenue of 100 disease-resistant elms in Pontcanna Fields, Cardiff, in April

This year I am following an avenue of 100 disease-resistant elms, Ulmus ‘New Horizon’, in Pontcanna Fields, Cardiff.

When I visited just over a month ago there were little red flowers with no petals. Now these have disappeared and the trees are greening up with their pretty, slightly lopsided leaves.

These leaves are “alternate” (spiral, not exactly opposite each other), with simple, “doubly serrate” margins (meaning there are smaller serrations within the serrations), asymmetric at the base and “acuminate” (tapering) at the apex.

Read Full Post »

Tree following link box for April 2017

The arrival of green leaves heralds the falling of these magnificent pink Magnolia soulangeana blooms in a front garden I walked past this week

The April tree-following link box is now closed, but below are the links tree followers have shared this month.

Here in South Wales we are coming to the end of the pink and white cherry blossom season but most of the magnolias are still magnificent.

Some people have already chosen a new tree to follow – but spring is a great time for you to join us.

There’s no rush, you can join in at any time and you don’t really have to contribute every single month if that’s too much for you.

If you are new to tree following, read all about it here.

And without further ado, here are those links…

Alison at the Blackberry Garden – quince

Hollis (In the Company of Plants and Rocks) – Sabalites powellii fossil

Erika Groth in Sweden – rowan (Sorbus aucuparia)

Amy in the Sonoran Desert (A Small Sunny Garden) –
Arizona rosewood (Vauquelinia californica)

Mike – Flighty’s Plot – Liz’s tulip poplar (Liriodendron tulipifera) and Flighty’s dogwood (Cornus)

John Kingdon – The Rivendell Garden Blog – bombed by crabs

Frances at Island Threads, off the North West coast of Scotland – rowan (Sorbus aucuparia)

Pat – Squirrelbasket – elm leaves and fruit

April Hughes – fiddle tree – Liriodendron tulipifera

Thank you to everyone – see you all again on May 7!

Read Full Post »

From the non-digital archive: Connemara in the 1990s

The landscape of Connemara in Ireland in the summer of 1996

Summer’s coming and its that time of year for thinking about faraway places. I have been going through my old 35mm negatives and decided to sort out some shots from Ireland in the 1990s. They aren’t too bad, but it’s sad to think what better pictures I could take now with a digital camera!

We went to Ireland for several years in a row, ranging farther and farther to the west, and for me the most wonderful landscape of all was in Connemara, an area of lakes and mountains to the north and west of Galway city.

Read Full Post »