‘Blood-dipped’ Parrotia leaves in September
There is not much new in my monthly tree-following bulletin this time.
The Persian ironwood (Parrotia persica) in my garden still has a mixture of healthy green leaves in the shade and red-edged leaves on the branches reached by the sun.
We have had a great deal of rain in the last month in South Wales but also plenty of sun, so the tree seems to be thriving.
Still plenty of green leaves – which I hope will offer autumn colour later
Those ‘aerial roots’ or twiglets are a real feature, not just a fluke
With the sun behind them the leaves are even brighter
I’m not sure if these are late seeds or early buds for next year
There are some developments, though – we have asked a tree surgeon to pollard the big self-seeded sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus) that overshadows the Parrotia.
He is here mainly to cut back the oversized sweetgum on our front lawn (Liquidambar styraciflua) but I thought I would ask for the other job as well. We shall see if the ironwood survives OK. The tree man at least knew the species, as he said “lovely autumn colour”.
I haven’t looked through all my old pictures, but this was the tree in November 2014, showing different colours
We are also having someone in to rebuild the rotting fence beside the ironwood, which is possibly more of a hazard. Although reassuringly when the contractor knew it was an ironwood he said you wouldn’t tackle THAT with a chainsaw (we had been discussing chainsaws). So hopefully no one will damage it, at least intentionally.
The tree is close to the fence we are having replaced – that’s the neighbour’s garden beyond
A feather from a wood pigeon (Columba palumbus) on the steps under the Parrotia tree
Hopefully there will be more change (for the better) in October, and not too much damage from the contractors…
The Squirrelbasket 
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