Look
How many times do you walk past without pausing to look at the trees?
Their growth patterns tell stories of fighting for light, coping with drought and surviving having bark stripped by deer and squirrels.
Challenge: Tree Identification
Beech | Commonest tree here. Smooth grey bark. Curving leaf edges have short teeth. New leaves soft green and hairy in spring. |
Holly | Holly leaves are very spiny lower down. Find a taller holly tree and look up – higher holly leaves are less prickly. How does the tree know how high its leaves are? |
Oak | Bark cracked into crevices of short, narrow plates. Sinuous leaves deeply divided into lobes. |
Yew | The dark conifer with soft brown bark and a knobbly trunk. Poisonous seeds One of the hardest of all woods. Separate male and female trees. |
Hazel | A few small trees scattered about. The slightly heart-shaped leaf has a ragged tooth edge and a long drip tip. |
Field Maple | lovely tree near the middle of the trail. Soft, slightly spongy bark in small plates and deeply lobed leaves around a central palm |
Hawthorn | Only two hawthorns here? Clue - one is by the dog bin. Pale grey bark and thorns on main stems. Where is the other? |
Why do several of the beech trees have dense twiggy growths at their bases?
Called epicormic growth, this is probably a sign of some sort of stress or disease. Dormant buds that weren't used as the tree grew get clustered together below the bark. Then for some reason they get triggered to grow.
Not sure which way to grow?
Look for the Wonky Oak in the middle of the path (what3words - sweat.polar.tarnished) . Its trunk wiggles as the tree tried to find the light in between the beech trees and grow straight. It was stressful, so its grown lots of twiggy epicormic growth up the trunk.
Look up: this oak didn't have much luck finding room for a canopy, but its two main branches are keeping the oak alive (Also spot the round tree hole. A bird's nest or a bat roost?)
Look Too
Leaf us alone! Prickly Holly Leaves & thorny bramble stems.
The more deer eat us, the pricklier we get.
Look for the blotch mines of the Holly leaf miner fly Phytomyza ilici
Silver looping trails across brambles leaves have been made by the caterpillars of the moth Stigmella aurella
Bramble is a very variable plant. 320 distinct types (microspecies) are recognised in the UK, many endemic.
The low straggly bramble of the woodland floor is specific to shady woods. Notice it has much smaller thinner prickles than the tall hedgerow brambles that good for blackberries.
Shape shifter
Stop and look closely at ivy. Notice how variable its leaves are. Ivy spreading along the ground is juvenile. When it finds a tree (or wall) to climb up the leaves higher up become oval, and the plant will flower. Oval Ivy leaves are hard to spot in these woods as deer find them very tasty (leaves on the ground are not). A healthy tree will not be harmed by ivy, but luxuriant growth in tree canopies can make a sail that can pull a tree down in winter storms. There is some evidence that ivy is increasing under global warming.
Look for:
Different shapes of Ivy leaves. Notice how hairy and rough Ivy stems on trees are to help them climb. Peel a little bit of ivy stem back to see the pattern of the fine corkscrew roots it uses to hook on.
Prepared by Kathy Meakin on behalf of Twinberrow Foundation, November 2023.
Many sources were consulted in preparing 'wander and wonder' information. Peter Thomas, 2000, Trees: their Natural History, Colin Tudge, 2006 The Secret Life of Trees and Peter Wohlleben 2017 The Hidden Life of Trees deserve special mention.