2017 tree following 8: Darker days are drawing near

One of very few yellow leaves fallen from the 100 elm trees in Pontcanna Fields, Cardiff

I really shouldn’t be disappointed, but I was hoping for a hint of fall colour in the 100 disease-resistant elms, Ulmus ‘New Horizon’, in Pontcanna Fields this month. After all, September is officially the start of autumn, according to the weather people.

The trees may still be as green and lush as ever, but the weather has definitely become more “back-end-ish” as the daylight hours grow shorter. The summer never did come to anything, the rain continues and now it’s getting colder, too.

There’s that distinctive something in the air that inspires nostalgia for childhood and renewed ambitions to cuddle up and do something creative.

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News from the world of trees 2017 #7

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.

They call it ‘crown shyness’

Tree tops avoid touching and create the appearance of winding rivers in this collection of stunning images on Mail Online…

Spain must raze all vegetation on Mallorca, says EU report

The Spanish island of Mallorca could be virtually razed of vegetation under an EU plan to halt the march of a deadly bacteria known as ‘ebola of the olive’, reports the Telegraph…

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Cracking mystery of the stone head

A mysterious crack has appeared in this stone head in the lounge

I have been meaning to compile a blog post about my favourite “ancient stone heads of the world” for a while – and now I have an excuse. The small stone head I bought at the Ideal Home Exhibition in the 1980s has suddenly developed a crack.

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At the pavement’s edge

The magnificent blotched leaves of Persicaria maculosa, which I have always known by its old Linnaean name of Polygonum persicaria

In the absence of any other ideas, I felt it was time to have a look again at street plants (weeds, some might say). With all the rain recently it has been a good year for the pavement greenery. Here are a few examples from just one main road near my Cardiff home.

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Popcorn hydrangea goes crazy

My popcorn hydrangea ‘Ayesha’ is starting to show a range of flower shapes

It’s six years now since I first posted about my popcorn hydrangea ‘Ayesha’, but this summer, with all the rain, it has grown huge and vigorous. It has also started to diversify! Usually the flowers remind me of lilac but now the sepals are starting to appear flat as in many other hydrangeas.

I thought the proper word for it was “recidivism”, which I thought also applied to variegated leaves turning back to plain green, but now I can find no reference to this word botanically, only in the sense of a prisoner returning to a life of crime or a medical condition relapsing.

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2017 tree following 7: A time of swallows

Fresh growth on one of the 100 elms in Pontcanna Fields, Cardiff

A month ago we were coming to the end of a mini-heatwave, but now I can hardly remember a day without rain this summer. It’s very cool for August, too.

I visited the 100 disease-resistant elms, Ulmus ‘New Horizon’, in Pontcanna Fields one morning this week and drizzle was threatening.

The recent wet weather means the elms are looking as green as ever and not much has changed since last month.

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Tree following link box for August 2017

Dead branches on a sycamore in my garden

The tree-following link box has now closed for another month. To explore everyone’s updates, please go straight to the bottom of this post.

Why don’t you join us and follow a tree, too? You can start at any time and you don’t have to contribute every month if that’s too much of a commitment for you.

Here in Cardiff there have been very heavy showers for a few weeks and it’s hard to believe it’s the height of summer. But at least it’s good for the garden. That means the dead branches I can see on a self-seeded sycamore tree (Acer pseudoplatanus) in the garden are nothing to do with drought.

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