rosiep wrote:I wonder if any of you would, like myself, plant a tree in your own gardens..obviously space permitting.....we could have a 2006 Plant a selfsufficientish tree occasion. I am going to plant exactly the same one, I've already found a tree nursery online that I can get one from, my neighbour is also going to plant one....would anyone else fancy joining in? if so can you post and let me know which tree you decide on.
A tree is a great legacy to carry on when we've gone and they are so beautiful!
Rosie x
We've been planting trees and hedgerows since we moved here, but the cost starts getting prohibitive when you have a place with a bit of land and few trees.
We keep asking relatives and friends to give us (and the boys) trees for birthday and Christmas presents instead of gadgets and plastic tat, but the message doesn't seem to get through.
Our idea is to plant specimen trees at key points around the place (boundary corners, along ploughing sight lines etc), establish a couple of coppices on 10-year cycles, plant wildlife habitats in the corners of the fields where tractors can't turn, plant hedgerows, and set up a couple of small orchards.
To provide firewood we'd need to fell 10-15 coppiced trees a year over the 10-year cycle. That would mean planting 15 treees for coppicing every year for 10 years, plus at least five specimen trees a year, plus hedgerow plus fruit trees.
So, we aim to put in a lot of specifically Scottish natives (oak, birch, alder, aspen, dwarf birch, hazel, juniper, rowan, Scots pine) plus other British natives like blackthorn, hawthorn, holly, dog rose etc. Then more apple and plum trees.
The other big issue is finding locally sourced stock - the situation is slowly improving but many of the "Scottish" natives actually come from big nurseries in England so you lose the genetic adaptation to local conditions.
We've put in rowan, alder, holly, blackthorn, hawthorn and dog rose so far but would really like to get some Scots pine, oak, birch and juniper in ASAP.
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