When I awoke early this morning, it was to the sound of dripping. At first I thought it was a tap or possibly a leaking tap, but a look out the window revealed all the ice and frost that has been our lot for the past couple of weeks was disappearing fast.
That had me up, dressed and out the door in a flash, because a thaw meant the ground could be worked and if the ground could be worked, then I could be planting some of our new trees.
Of course, all the chores and breakfast had to come first but they were pushed through in good time, leaving the rest of the morning free for planting.
We decided to plant a line of osier (Salix viminalis) along the top of the pig paddock first. They’re fast growing, so will give the pigs shelter from the sun and wind within a couple of years. We’ll be able to use some of the withies for making sturdy baskets and the like, while after six to eight years we’ll also have a supply of firewood to see us through until our ash coppice is ready (we’ll be planting osier for the next five years).
The osiers were planted 2.5 metres apart and one metre off the fence line, with the row anchored by an oak tree that will be there for the long-term. And as measuring is one of the Big Lad’s favourite jobs at the moment, who better to handle the metre rule.
I used a spade to cut a slot at the desired location, and then turn the spade 90 degrees to make an X. Not all the osier needed the X, but the slot method is the easiest and quickest method for planting trees with a wide spread of roots. (Oak, with its long tap root, needed a deep hole made with a crowbar as well as the slot.)
The osier is slid into the tree guard. Root first is usually best and easiest but, occasionally, awkward roots mean you have to carefully fold the branches into the trunk and slide the guard over the top of the tree.
The root is then slid into the slot, ensuring that the ground level is the same as the marked on the tree trunk. Make sure all the root system is below ground level.
A closer look at the tree being slid into the slot - all the visible area has to go into the ground in this case.
A stake is then knocked in, allowing space for the tree roots, and the tree guard is then attached to the stake with a cable tie. A second person is useful to hold the tree out of the way.
Thirteen trees later and we have the beginnings of an avenue of osier. These should be ready for harvesting around the time the Big Lad is 13 or 14, while the oaks we’re planting will be for them to show their teenage children and, hopefully, teenage grandchildren. Yes, we’re looking ahead!
As well as the osier, we planted five pendunculate oaks (Quercus robur) - one to anchor the line of osier and the other four on boundary corners or where fence lines turn.
That’s great to see - thinking that far ahead. Drowsing (briefly) in bed with OH this morning we were appreciating a 200-year-old holme oak in a neighbouring property and reflecting that people don’t plant for the future any more because there isn’t a realistic expectation that their kids will live in the same place. It’s nice to see some of us are trying to buck the trend.
We should try to guide our actions now based on how the effects of those actions will impact on the following seven generations (about 150 years).
The oaks should be standing tall by then, nature and man permitting!
Seven generations? Why seven?
Even if your kids aren’t living there when the trees mature, somebody will, and with luck they’ll appreciate your thinking ahead and resolve to do the same themselves.
I’d like to say a big thank you to whoever planted the cherry and damson trees in our garden. I had the last frozen cherry pie the other day and it was a delicious taste of summer.
Two main reasons.
In the first, it draws on the Gayaneshakgowa, the Great Law of Peace of the Hau de no sau nee, the Six Nations Iroquois Confederacy. The Gayaneshakgowa says that “in our every deliberation we must consider the impact of our decisions on the next seven generations”.
It’s about realising that we as present-day individuals are ephemeral in the greater order of things and so we have a responsibility to consider how what we do now will affect things for those generations to come.
It’s also about realising that we are only temporarily entrusted with the environment about us and if we allow ourselves to be selfish, greedy and self-indulgent in our exploitation of nature, then we will bring harm on those who follow.
My second reason is that I’m a keen family historian. If I look back at each generation, I can see how they built the future for me. They may or may not have fully considered their actions at the time, but I still feel that I owe it to those who’ve gone before to consider my own actions as a way of building the future for those who come after me.
It works for me.
Amen to that - just wondered why seven generations in particularly. It seems that Society has difficulty looking ahead even twenty years. Hoorah for planting trees.
I should have added a third reason, but my brain isn’t working today. A traditional coppice would have had oaks as standards (side-pruned) over ash, hazel and the like. The ash and hazel would be cropped on 10-20 year cycles with the oak felled at 130-150 years/
That fits nicely with seventh generation thinking, too.