The march of the mother trees

Pip at European Trees paints a compelling picture of the slow eastward drift of traditionally managed woodlands in France.

If we had access to satellite imagery from the last two centuries would we be able to create time lapse aerial photos of a woodland canopy showing the Mother trees as a front, semi circular waves marching eastwards similar to the pattern seen at the front of lapping waves on a shallow beach?

Read the rest of the post to learn just what the heck he’s talking about here.

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Arboreal photo-blogging roundup

Luara Hegfield has been posting some wonderfully atmospheric photos of trees to accompany her blog entries for the “river of stones” January mindful writing challenge (see the Writing Our Way home blog for more on that). I especially liked this one of tree branches at dusk, these three of trees and water, and this lone birch.

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Welsh painter Clive Hicks-Jenkins blogged some photos from his holiday visit to the medieval town of Sarlat in southern France, which included a shot of some awesomely grotesque trees which look as if they’ve been pollarded every year since the 14th century.

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On Wednesday, London blogger Jean Morris shared a stunningly blue collage calling attention to “The shapes of trees.”

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Back on January 4, Buddhist nun and photographer Seon Joon expressed her “new year’s resolutions: worship” in visual form, with three very arboreal photos. She included this quote:

I am glad I belong to a religion that worships a tree.
—Stephen Batchelor, Confessions of a Buddhist Atheist

The trouble with leaf blowers

An eye-opening post from European Trees makes it clear that leaf-blowers are far more than an auditory annoyance.

The threat from existing pathogens and non native invasive species, the threat from climate change factors and the stresses placed upon trees, particularly urban trees by way of human detritus, including domestic pet excrement or urine is compounded by the use of these machines.

Wow. Who knew?

When forestry cultures clash

Pip Howard at europeantrees maintains that British Woodland & Forest Design is not suitable for Export. He explains that there are historic and cultural reasons behind forest design in the UK and France, principally based on boundary lines of landowners, and the alteration of this system by expats moving to seek a better lifestyle with land in France is leading to problems. Can they adopt a new system allowing for the best management to guard against forest pests and diseases, or are traditional methods simply too culturally engrained?