It has been a formidable start to the growing season with the weather lurching from one extreme to another. We started off with an incredibly wet winter, then we had a dry warm March and April to get growth going before its time, followed by a sharp frost in mid-May during a prolonged period of drought which was then topped off by unseasonal heavy gale force winds that are usually confined to the winter. Climate change is happening right in front of our eyes……

Out of all these events, the late frost was the most significant. You can compensate with hand watering in periods of drought but there isn’t a lot you can do when you get a late and widespread frost. We have had reports from customers in Yorkshire saying their Hosta’s were burnt right back to nothing, from Oxfordshire reporting -4c which fried off all the new foliage of trees newly planted and established, from Rutland where Ash and Walnut were severely set back and of course at Barcham where we suffered tip burn off on our young field crops. Genus particularly prone to frost damage include Ash, Oak, Walnut, Sweet Chestnut, Mulberry, and Pyrus to name but a few. Ornamental genus like Paulownia, Catalpa, Cercidyphllum, Magnolia, Pterocarya and Davidia also take a blasting.

However, this is all part of nature’s cycle. About 10 years ago we had -6c in May that even turned the wheat black in the neighboring fields. But don’t despair! Although the season’s growth is never as good after a late frost the trees do recover by mid-summer to look decent again. New leaders are grown and new flushes of growth overtake the blackened legacy of May. To compound the damage we only had 4mm of rainfall in May instead of our average 50mm and this trend traversed a lot of the country. Without supplementing the lack of rainfall at this critical time for growth, new leaves are often small and new flushes are slow to come.

The gale force winds last week damaged new flushed leaves with genus like Carpinus (Hornbeam) particularly affected. We have just had some very welcome rain and we are now all looking forward to three months of stability so the trees can finally get growing without interruption!

Common Walnut burnt by frost:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Common Walnut re-shooting after late frost:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sweet Chestnut leader lost by late frost:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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It’s a question asked of us frequently but generally a tree confined to a life in a pot doesn’t work out well. Trees are big and complex organisms and their root systems need a lot of soil volume to colonize to maintain a mature canopy. It is estimated that a big tree such as an Oak or Hornbeam needs a minimum of 30m3 of soil for the roots to fulfil the tree’s potential. Even the smallest of trees such as a Crab Apple or Japanese Cherry would need 10m3.

And that’s a big pot if you want trees where there is no soil to plant them!

Once a tree is confined within a container too small for it to grow, the roots circle within the confines to become a block of wood and good for nothing. The top of the tree lingers and slowly declines, looking ugly and not fulfilling your original objective. The root system also runs out of nutrient and because the majority of the soil volume is taken up by root it is a devil to get the container to hold water so the tree suffers with drought. To cap it all, in very cold winters the soil in the container freezes solid as it is above ground and not insulated like soil under an expansive ground level. This leads to a condition where the tree ‘freezes dry’ in that the plant cannot take up water as it is all in the form of ice.

So, with all that in mind we don’t advise keeping trees confined in containers. It’s like keeping a tiger in a small cage and they are too precious a resource to mitigate against climate change to waste in this way. In our opinion!

But it’s not all doom and gloom, there is an answer!

I was faced with very poor privacy from our gravel driveway to our garden. There was a strip in front of the cars that I converted to the biggest raise planting bed I could fit in using old oak sleepers and in the end I managed to create an environment that held about 4m3 of our Barcham Blend compost. I was fortunate that the planter went on top of free draining gavel as this wouldn’t work on tarmac or concrete. Eventually, in wet winters the planter would fill up with water if there was nowhere for it to go and the plants within it would drown. The soil / compost you fill the planter with has to be coarse to avoid compaction. A fine compost / loam will gently settle over the years of watering to squeeze the oxygen out. Roots need water and oxygen blended in measure to thrive.

I filled my raised planter with our medium sized Phyllostachys aurea, Golden bamboo. This plant is very invasive, suckering up all over the place so it is perfect for the confines of a raised planter. It gave me day one screening and a year down the line it has made a tremendous difference to the privacy in our garden. The beauty of bamboo is that you can coppice it down to ground level in early April and it will regrow to over two metres again in a matter of months. When it gets too raggedy I will do this, probably when my family aren’t looking. If you do this on a three to five year cycle it retains a lush and great evergreen screen. And, importantly, sustainable for growing in the confines of a container or raised planter that holds a minimum of 3m3. The bigger your container is, the more soil volume it holds and the better your result.

PS There are plenty of options for buying containers of planters bespoke to fit your area. Just google the term ‘raised planter’ and this will get you started.

 

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Case Study: South Luffenham Parish Council

A small village in Rutland decided to convert the parameter of the Parish Recreational Ground to Carbon Offset tree planting. Using a mix of trees from instant impact ‘Medium’ sized Barcham trees to smaller ‘Starter Stock’ 2 year old Barcham trees that we have supplied in 5lt pots for ease of handling. The emphasis is that every tree planted will be a winner as they have invested in a Barcham root system to power establishment. With this in mind they have adopted a ‘less is more’ approach and have spaced their trees at between 7 and 10 metres apart. This negates the need for costly thinning out of stock later on down the line and produces robust stock that can develop as large specimen trees that maximizes potential for locking up carbon.

Another criteria is that a broad range of genus were planted to safeguard against future threats from pest and disease that are usually host specific. Trees with an expected long lifespan were also preferred as the benefits for Carbon Capture are extended for varieties that live for a minimum of 300 years.

The Parish also recognised the importance of protecting the newly created environment as there is no point to plant trees for subsequent generations if the land is going to be developed later on down the line. The Parish have written protection into their constitution and approached the Local Council Tree Officer to further protect by Tree Preservation Order.

To support this endeavour, a local grant was secured to convert an existing small brick building on the site to a water holding facility so the newly planted trees can be watered in the summer. A 1 cubic metre water tank is filled from rainfall collection from the roof via the guttering. An industrial water butt!

Their soil is free draining and to maximize success the following methods were employed to give the trees the very best of starts:

1. The top grass layer was shaved off using a garden spade to remove future competition from around the tree. Only a 5cm layer was removed as the top of the soil is generally the most nutritious and should be retained.

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. A good sized hole is excavated to de-compact the soil. 65cm in diameter to accommodate a 5 litre ‘Starter Stock’ tree, 100m diameter to accommodate a 35-65 litre ‘Medium’ tree. Loosen the soil to double fork depth throughout the hole.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. Turn the soil within the hole to get a nice crumb structure. Tree roots need water and oxygen blended in measure in which to thrive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

4. Remove the 100% recyclable Barcham pot to reveal the root system. Barcham roots grow vertically down the confines of their container without spiralling so need no teasing out.

 

 

5. Use a saw to shave the base of the root system to get outward facing root to facilitate rapid establishment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

6. Only shave off 1cm from the base of the root system.

 

 

 

 

 

 

7. Get the planting depth right. Trees hate being planted too deep. The top of the compost should be at ground level, before the mulch is applied, after planting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

8. Use a 6 litre watering can with rose attachment to water in your newly planted tree. This firms up the soil particles around the root system without compacting the soil. Do not firm in by applying pressure onto the soil. This just undoes all the good work you have put in to de-compact the soil in the first place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

9. Fit a Barcham rabbit guard around the tree and then top off with 25 litres of mulch. The rabbit guard prevents the mulch from butting up to the stem of the tree and the mulch both protects the soil from drying out as well as suppressing weeds, especially grass, that would otherwise strongly complete with the newly planted tree in the first growing season after planting.

 

 

Even though it is very beneficial to do so, it may not be practical to water your trees in the subsequent summer. If ‘Starter Stock’ trees are installed in this way between October and the end of February you can often get away without subsequent watering but you may experience losses in years of intense heat and drought. It is a must however for ‘Medium’ trees to be routinely watered every two weeks from May through to September so only plant as many as you can maintain. In most cases they are established enough after the first growing season to be able to look after themselves thereafter.

If you plant following the guidelines above you can be sure of a successful scheme!

Barcham ‘Starter Stock’ is new to the market, previously used just for our own internal production to grow trees on in our fields to bigger sizes. The trees are of UK providence with seed often collected by us from preferred mature trees from around the UK. They are grown in a 5 litre Barcham Light Pot and are supplied with a second hand Barcham Rabbit Guard. Easy for children to handle to encourage community plantings, the trees are about 1.25-1.5m tall. They are £18.75 each (including VAT and rabbit guard) and available for planting from October through to February on request. The trees are also supplied with a fitted small bamboo cane which can be retained at planting. This supports the tree during establishment, negating the need to stake. Stock numbers are limited so we advise reserving in the summer for autumn planting.

If you are local enough to Barcham and only require small numbers, these trees are small enough to fit in a car to collect and save on delivery charges. Please refer to the sales team for advice on this. We can only accept collections for pre ordered trees as we need time and notice to collate orders from the nursery.

For more information please contact the sales team, [email protected]

 

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We had our yearly external audit review for ISO 14001 last week and the assessor gave our Environmental Management System a clean bill of health. No non conformities to procedure and no recommendations for improvement. This time the auditor also included an on-site audit of our landscaping team whilst they were on a planting job in Suffolk, before spending a day and a half scrutinizing our procedures here at Barcham.

Barcham remains the only nursery of its type to have ISO 14001 certification. For us, this environmental standard goes hand in hand with our product and what we are trying to achieve for the wider environment.

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When thinking of planting the best trees for the environment, think in terms of the ones that live the longest and get the biggest. The bigger the tree the greater the carbon store it locks away to mitigate the effects of climate change. To allow these trees to fulfil their potential plant them 20 metres apart from each other in a free draining field that provides plenty of soil volume for them to exploit their full potential. We would also recommend putting a covenant on the land to prevent it from future development for at least 300 years. There is no point in making a big statement for the environment unless the fruits of your labours are protected long after you are gone.

Importantly, select a wide range of genus so if some calamity in terms of pest or disease besets one, the rest of your planting won’t be effected. The following trees can form the backbone of your carbon offset scheme. Shorted lived trees, such as Betula or Prunus can be planted in between them if you want a more instant day one look but fix your plan on them not being there after 50-100 years by which time the long lived heavyweights of the UK treescape can take over.

Acer pseudoplatanus, Sycamore 200-300 years

Carpinus betulus, Hornbeam 200-300 years

Fagus sylvatica, Beech, 300-400 years

Gingko biloba, Maidenhair Tree 500-1000 years

Juglans nigra, Black Walnut, 200-300 years

Liriodendron tulipifera, Tulip Tree, 200-300 years

Metasequoia glyptostroboides , Dawn Redwood, 200-250 years

Pinus nigra Austriaca, Corsican Pine, 300-500 years

Quercus ilex, Holm Oak 500-1000 years

Quercus robur, Oak, 300-500 years

Sequoiadendron giganteum, Redwood, 1000-2000 years

Taxus baccata, Yew, 500-600 years

Tilia cordata, Small Leaved Lime, 500-750 years

Tilia platyphyllos, Broad Leaved Lime, 500-750 years

Only 6 from our list are classified as UK natives and it is our opinion that ornamental trees play a massive part to play in future planting to create a mix diverse enough to cope with the rigours of climate change. There will become a time when future governments incentivise people for doing this type of planting. For now, know that it is the right thing to do if you have any spare land lying idle. A tree will really start to positively impact on carbon offsetting from about 30 years into its growing cycle, so this work is not for your benefit but for the generations that come after. What a legacy it would be if this thinking was adopted throughout the span of the UK.

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Climate change and how to halt it is finally beginning to gain traction. It is estimated that here in the UK we need to plant 50 million trees a year until 2050 to stand a chance of carbon neutrality. That is all well and good but maintaining these trees through their establishment phase to ensure they contribute to the cause is often overlooked. With this in mind here are a few tips to apply when planting a tree in your garden to make sure it thrives and makes a difference:

Never plant a tree deep. In nature a seed will fall to the ground and germinate in the spring with the root going down and the shoot going up. When planting a containerised tree the top of the compost should be at ground level, (with the pot removed), to ensure the roots are not deep within the soil profile. If you dig a as the soil consolidates so the emphasis is in width rather than depth. Tree roots want Oxygen and water blended in measure. Please look at this four minute planting video as a demonstration of how to plant a container tree.

Watch out for weed competition. Assuming your tree has been planted correctly into a soil that has been worked to give a viable structure, the best thing to do is water it in. Planting in the autumn and winter is always preferable for deciduous trees and root growth will consolidate even during the winter months if there is enough moisture and the temperature underground hovers above 10 degrees Celsius. However, by looking after your trees the weeds will also flourish. Grass in particular is very competitive when it comes to tree establishment so we would recommend at least a one metre radius around the tree should be kept completely fallow. This area can be topped up with a 5cm bark mulch to protect the soil from capping dry and to encourage a microbial exchange up through the soil into the mulch and back again, so maintaining a healthy soil structure. Try to avoid weed killers, this could be taken up by the tree as well and cause more harm than good.

Watering in the first growing season. The first taster we are getting from climate change is a shift to more extreme weather patterns. We get more intense hot spells and longer periods of drought, especially in the South and East of the UK. Trees have evolved to harvest rainfall so try and mimic this. A garden sprinkler does a good job to copy a cloud burst but this rate of application still gives time for the soil to grip the water so the roots can access it. I see little point in planting the tree in a load of plastic sundries such as watering pipes and root chambers as we are trying to mitigate carbon use not accentuate it. For its first summer, I would water your newly planted tree in this manner once a week. If you have a hose pipe ban then a good backup is our tree hydration bag which delivers water nice and slowly to the root system and surrounding soil.

With all this in play your tree should get away nicely and be a good contributor to lock up a little bit of carbon. Clive Anderson, an ambassador for the Woodland Trust, being planted in the UK. said we did not need a new ‘clever bit of kit’ to climate change as ‘that device already exists. It’s called a tree’.

It’s about all we can collectively agree on. Otherwise all that results from these environmental summits is paradoxically a load of hot air. Any worthwhile legislation to mitigate climate change is inevitably economically compromising so will not happen. Trees do not offend and do the job we cannot agree to fix.

    

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Over the last twelve months the management team at Barcham has set itself the aim of ISO14001 accreditation. We have looked at all levels within our business in terms of environmental aspects and impacts and set ourselves rigorous objectives and targets such as increasing our recycling levels and reducing the use of peat. We have looked at the business in its entirety, rather than just scope the parts of our operations that we can take an easy win from. Even our coffee machine came under scrutiny and is a good example of the environmental con that we are all living through. Every day we were feeling very cosy about disposing our coffee cups into the recycling thinking we were doing the right thing but it turns out that these ‘may be recycled’ items could not be recycled at all, certainly not in the UK anyway. So we ditched the machine for a traditional china cup option that can be washed up in perpetuity. The irony is that the machine that supplies these delivers a far superior coffee and even the pods that feed it are recycled.

But this is the way of it. The more we looked into it, the more savings we made in both economic and environmental terms. This standard has also brought the business closer together. Everyone has been involved and communication within the business has become so much more inclusive and worthwhile. Suggestions for improvement are no longer forgotten with time but are logged instead and fully discussed each month to assess. We collectively decided that we can do the right thing environmentally for our 200 acre business and if we choose to take this home to our private lives so much the better.

Our eyes have been well and truly opened. Retail outlets displaying recycling logos on their packaging are invariably misleading. It is trendy to appear environmental but the greening up of businesses still has a heavy pinch of corporate greed rather than doing the right thing for the sake of doing the right thing.

As far as we are aware Barcham is the only wholesale tree grower that has achieved ISO14001. We have incorporated our biosecurity policy and procedures into the standard and hope others will follow our lead on this.

ISO14001 is exacting and daunting in the first instance. It can give management teams palpitations in terms of perceived financial outlay to achieve. However it represents a cultural shift within a business and delivers very good value for money if embraced wholeheartedly.

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With a much needed government ban on Quercus (Oak) imports coming in a few weeks ago, UK home production of Oak will soon be sold out in larger sizes. Oak Processionary Moth is unfortunately in the UK and will spread alarmingly unless landowners are extremely vigilant to eradicate it as soon as it is detected. At least no more infected imports should come from Holland, Germany or Belgium where the pest has reached epidemic proportions.

Good native parkland alternatives include Acer campestre (Field Maple), Carpinus betulus (Hornbeam), Fagus sylvatica (Beech), Populus tremula (Aspen) and Tilia platyphyllos (Broad Leaved Lime). The need for diversity is paramount to futureproof the threat of pest and disease which are often genus specific. Try not to depend on a single genus to account for more than 10% of your planting design.

A lot of us are fixated by planting native trees but with Oak and Ash off the menu it’s like trying to pick a cricket team with only 9 players left to choose from! Climate change, whatever Donald Trump says on the subject, is happening and our native trees may not be the best thing to concentrate on. They have evolved to thrive within a fixed set of parameters and this is swiftly altering.

To achieve a diverse mix of planting, design will have to include some non-native genus. These are well tested and known to thrive within the UK landscape; it’s just a question of using them sympathetically to match the location. Ginkgo biloba (Maidenhair Tree) makes a great city tree but may look rather out of place in a parkland setting. However, Ostrya carpinifolia (Hop Hornbeam) or Zelkova serrata would look absolutely fine if mixed in with our native Lime, Hornbeam and Field Maple in a rural setting.

Acer pseudoplatanus should not be overlooked as a non-native weed. It is hugely successful beautiful parkland tree and without it there wouldn’t be much of a treescape in the Lake District. (Anyway, who is to say it is non-native, there is strong evidence to suggest it pre-dates us in the UK by some margin but we are the ones making the rules…)

Another key thing to get a natural looking treescape right is to match ultimate sizes of trees in the diverse mix you choose. There is little point in coupling up a Hornbeam with an Amelanchier and hoping they will look good together over the longer term and visa versa. If you are after large canopy trees to fulfil an rural landscape pick native and non-native varieties that readily grow beyond 20 metres in height with similar crown habits. Similarly, for your smaller garden areas, concentrate on trees that only get to seven metres ultimately. Either way they are steadily contributing to the environment and gently offsetting what our genus is doing to that…

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A plea to all specifiers and buyers of trees from Mike Glover, Managing Director at Barcham Trees Plc …..

“A recent trip to Holland underlined the devastation that can be caused by Oak Processionary Moth in only a few seasons. Each adult moth can lay up to 300 eggs. In three years this moth could be responsible for 27 million offspring!

And the problem is I saw hundreds of thousands of caterpillars last week in Holland and they are heading our way, hitching a lift on imported Oak Trees. The infestation is so advanced in Holland, (and probably elsewhere on the continent but I am only speaking about what I have seen first-hand), that imported oak will have a greater chance of this pest being present than not.

So what’s the problem? We’ve all liked playing with caterpillars in the garden as children but this pest packs a punch. When threatened, Oak Processionary Moth caterpillars projects their hairs into the air as a defence mechanism. If these are inhaled it can trigger life threatening asthma attacks, vomiting, severe skin rashes and massive eye irritation.

DEFRA have recognised this threat and have put strong and good measures in place to limit importation exposure but they have to work within the confines of the free market and their efforts will prove wanting unless a complete importation ban can be implemented. Oak Processionary Moth is already getting a good foothold in South Eastern England with control efforts costing a fortune to try and stamp it out.

And all for the sake of short term commercial gain or more likely complete ignorance of the situation. I started blogging about this in November 2017 and we are still sleepwalking into a catastrophe for our iconic British Oak which will have a major impact on public health. Recent high winds in the Netherlands prompted the authorities to urge people to shut their windows and doors in an effort to stop caterpillars blowing into their houses.

So the message has to be loud and clear. STOP BUYING IMPORTED OAK. Instead buy from a UK nursery that can prove to you that these trees have not just been shipped in to complete your order.

The biggest problem is lack of knowledge. If you know of anyone buying trees please make them aware of this blog and similar articles online.

Thank you.  Mike

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