daltontrees

Not even that. Some fungi fruit on bare wood. I expect anyone knowing why panic fruiting is not an entirely appropriate term will also know not to draw any conclusion from it. As such, I see harmless currency in the use of the term.

I agree. The term 'panic-fruiting', while I don't much like it myself, is fine in the right context. But it's not much more anthrpopmorphic than the concenpt of fungi having strategies, which they don't. They perhaps have 'modes' of colonisation, but they don't plan it out. The Oxford companion to animal behaviour (1987), albeit referreing to animals rather than fungi, advised that "one is well advised to study the behaviour rather than attempting to get at any underlying emotion". The lack of a better term that is as acccessible to the casually interested person suggests 'panic fruiting' will continue in use, and if it opens up lines of enquiry the budding (or should that be fruiting?) mycologist will be rewarded endlessly by discovering more and more complexities of fungi that we don't yet fully understand.

Here's a pico-factoid ona slow-fact day for anyone like me that didn't know what 'ruderal' means. 'The word ruderal comes from the Latin rudus rubble.' (Wikipedia - 5 minutes ago). Ruderal species are the first to colonise disturbed land. It seems to have a slightly wider ecological meaning such as "ability to thrive where there is disturbance through partial or total destruction of plant biomass" (Grime, Hodgson & Hunt, 1988).

Brings back to me an incident of my own a couple of years ago, I spotted a couple of scrotes clearing my car out at 2am. I had been working my proverbials off for weeks not bringing in quite enough to pay the bills and when I saw these wee batons I almost flipped, there they were helping themselves while I was tring to get enough sleep to get up the next day for an honest, tax-paying days toil. So what happened? One version (the official one) is that I persuaded them to leave, and the other one is that they narrowly escaped my base instincts to take out my frustrations on them. Blades were produced (by them), one of them was on hardcore drugs. It could have gone any way at all. And then I got rebuked by the police for having a baseball bat on me. "Baseball bat?", said I, "it's my walking stick". "That's better" said PC Goodguy. Here's the problem. Yopu pay taxes and you walk the right side of the line. Others don't. The law is on your side till you take the law into your own hands. But you only do that when the law lets you down. It's almost wild west round here sometimes, the police are so thin on the ground. If the state doesn't keep it's side of the deal I can see why scrotes will increasingly have unfortunate accidents in dark yards. The walking stick is on ice, but I'd warrant the animal in most of us is not far from thawing out at very short notice. Sorry guys, my therapist made me say all this. Or maybe I'm just mental. Go ahead punks...

A slighty odd situation. Regulation 15 makes the regulations for TPOs and CAs the same. Regulation 14 says "Nothing in regulation 13 shall prevent— "© the cutting down, uprooting, topping or lopping of a tree, to the extent that such works are urgently necessary to remove an immediate risk of serious harm, or to such other extent as agreed in writing by the authority prior to the works being undertaken; "(2) Where paragraphs (1)(a)(i) [dead] or (1)© apply, notice in writing of the proposed activities shall be given to the authority— (a) in the case of works urgently necessary to remove an immediate risk of serious harm, as soon as practicable after the works become necessary; and (b) in any other case at least five working days prior to the date on which the works are to be commenced." Stricti ly speaking, the Council may have agreed to the works (i.e. removal) and their condition is immaterial. I agree that the expression 'dangerous' is not quite the same as 'an immediate risk of serious harm' and if so the Regulations are clear that a 5 day notice must be put in, even though the Council has already agreed to removal. Or ask teh client to get the consultant to advise. It's got to be safer than going on the basis of advice on Arbtalk.

Make sure you are using Lumbricus terrestris, the compost worms only eat decaying vegetation but Lumbricus eats soil. They reproduce every 3 months, a handful every few square metres is all you need. It's a start, but sounds like decompaction and organic matter will be needed too. Possibly overseeding with clover for a season then turn it in when prepping the site, the nitrates and porosity are really beneficial.

I'd say holly, complete with leaf miner. Could be Highclere Holly Ilex x altaclarensis

Without reading all the papers cited in this fact of the day, I am tempted to suggest that there is a good reason to fertilise with mulch or manure that hasn't been mentioned. I am speaking now from direct and real experience of a current situation. The improvement of soil by adding organic material is beneficial for worms. They feed on this material and their daily vertical travel through soil is immeasurably beneficial for most plants including trees. Drainage, gas exchange and porosity for root development a re a few of the direct immediate benefits. The creation of a good humic content is less direct but very valuable. Within a year or two the tree can through leaf shedding and natural mulching and the normal recycling of short-term rootlet develop a steady equilibrium of worms and worm food, but unless the soil used for backfilling already contains worms and enough organic material to sustain them for a couple of years then the tree will lose all the benefits of wormy soil. So it's nothing to do with fertilising to feed the tree, it's to do with feeding the things that help the tree until it settles in. Soil without happy worms is almost dead, and that's not good for trees in it. Good point about fertilising late in the season. I'm not a fan of chemical fertilisers any time of year unless the environs of the tree are cheating it of recycling its own nitrates. In particular removing fallen leaves. The ideal seems to be to fertilise at the very time when last-year's leaf falll will have degraded and gone into the soil for uptake in early spring.

My Eucryphia x nymanensis flowered profucely for the first time this year, not quite a tree yet but putting on 1/2m every year.

Jon, that's my understanding too, the LA does not warrant the safety of roadside trees, But I think care is needed. If the Council notice says, 'if you don't make it safe within 14 days, we will' then the owner is off the hook and quire trgiuhtly because he has been given the option to do it or be billed when the Council does it and by what might be termed in law as acquiescence and taciturnity the onner is entitled to assume the matter is in the hands of the LA. It could certainly form the basis for a fairly robust negligence claim. If the notice says '...we can and may', that's a different matter.

I'd say Ganoderma sp. defiitely, and Ganoderma applanatum probably

David, excuse my clumsy delivery style, Gary is so much more diplomatic. But I will blunder on as I usually do, please don't be put off keeping up the debate. Beech sprouts from wide stumps, but it (in my purely direct experience) doesn't last and so it doesn't regenerate into a viable tree. A bud popping out from behind the bark rather than through it might not have a complete bark cambium connection to the stool. I am working aeay form home these days and don't have access to my library or to the few local examples on beech stumps I know of, so I can't really research my amateur theory just now. Maybe someday soon...

Call that regeneration? I don't see the Willow and Lime Coppice Marketing Board losing much sleep tonight? OK so I made a bit of a bold statement but it's generally true. As I wrote it I recalled a few isolated examples of regeneration non Beech and that in my memory the shoots had formed inside the bark rather than through it. That seems to be what happened in your first pics. I just saw a monkey puzzle stump about an hour ago regenrating from buds inside the bark. I'll try and get a picture but it will be a couple, of days before I pass it again. And if I am right, it asks interesting questions of how the new cambium of the shoots connect in the longer term to the stump cambium.

I speculated recently about this on UKTC, in short (most) conifers produce adventitious buds but these are reabsorbed within a few months unless used byt the tree. Beeck bark, for all that it is smooth and one might be tempted to think it is thin, is impenetrable by dormant buds. Cut a Beech back to any diameter more than a few inches and you will get no regeneration.

I knew his name, that was all, isolated bit of trivia. But you could be right, way back in those days medicine was developed wilth less concern for the human guinea pigs.

Felix Hoffman

The calcualtions are correct but be careful. Shigo says 0.1% is 'trapped' by plants. You then use the terms 'captured', 'utilised' and 'used'. Perhaps Shigo meant 'stored' but the otehr words you use could mean that and lesser interceptions such as warmth that is given out again as part of a daily cycle or as kinetic energy of released oxygen dioxide and heat energy of transpired water vapour. Then it gets all very complicated. Photosynthesis (storage of energy) is acelerated by warmth, so plants use solar energy indirectly too. What would be really interesting is to know how much energy is stored in plants as wood. Shigo concludes his bit on energy and mass by saying tha thte trapping of energy by trees is "the major benefit of trees to our living world". Much as I hate to disagree with 'the man', it is worth a mention (and referreing back to the fundamental chemistry of photosynthesis and respiration) that - 6 x water + 6 x carbon dioxide = monosaccharide (e.g. glucose) + 6 x Oxygen 6CO2 + 6H20 = C6H12O6 +6O2 That oxygen is not just a major benefit, it is essential to all animal life. Looking at trees and being warmed by firewood are benefits to life, but rank a little below breathing. Let's hear it for trees! Plants give, everything else just takes.

Cracking picture, beautiful really. Thanks for posting it.

That's the most recent example, yes. I don't think a High Court decision would really box off the question, it woul really need to be Court of Appeal or House of Lords to issue a codifying type of decision for public policy reasons. No-one is liley to take it that far for a triviality. The law is supposedly settled on this ussue but it is the one area of tree law that comes up again and again because t seems counter-intuitive. But tree encroachments are different from any others, it is the tree that encroaches slowly, creating a structure on another's property, yet to oblige a tree owner to ensure it never encroaches would be a ridiculous imposition by society, one that would be unneccessary for 99.9% of urban trees. So I suspect the law will remain that as far as branches are concerned the tree owner doesn't have to do anything until he is asked to and even then need do nothing until there is material harm to enjoyment. That might be damage, it might be loss of light, it might be loss of views but the courts might chuck it out if it's de minimis (trivial). With ensuing irrecoverable legal fees. Even if a civil action succeeds, will the court order the branches to be removed by the tree owner, or will it just award damages? And in between, would it award the costs already incurred by a neighbour for cutting back the nuisance? A clear judgement would be lovely.

Fair enough paul, I know you know the difference and for the average contractor wanting to stay in the right there is little actual difference between notifying the Council in writing ina CA and applying for consent in writing ina TPO. So at this point I have to split my attitude on this into Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde. The gentle doctor in me says, OK I will continue patiently pointing out as others often do on Arbtalk to those less well versed but eager to learn that there is a subtle but occasionally very important difference between the two processes - after all I get much from Arbtalk from experienced and learned people, so I should give back without bitterness. Mr. Hyde meantime wants to shout ' oh FFS, if you are new to this have a look at the Government website, your local Council website or spend 10 seconds doing a search here on Arbtalk or even just google it and any of these options will give a clear and frank explanation of the difference...', the subtext being '... you lazy git, make an effort'. Time and other people's laziness has obviously made me cynical, and I apologise. But if someone on t'internet wants a fish it is hard to know whether he wants to be given one or to be taught to fish. I will try to be less snippy, knowing that I will continue occasionally to fail. I put it down to sleep deprivation, my seemingly perennial companion.

This has been debated. The encroachment needs to be substantial to the point of being actionable at-law before the exemption applies, and the exemption does not allow cutting back to the boundary, just enough cutting back as is necessary to remove the (actionable) nuisance.

I thought the wording was perfect ('allow the notified works to proceed'). As GP hints at, it is tiresome to see the misunderstanding about 'consent' being needed in CAs being perpetuated and having to be clarified again and again and again on Arbtalk.

And hybridisation is a continuous phenomenon, with succesful natural hybrids best suited to local situations changing the local genetic balance. Eventually after a few generations these may lose the ability to back-cross with their progenitors, and that combined with even minor genetic mutations along the way is the essence of a new subspecies or even a new species. For species taking decades to reach sexual maturity, this will be slow, but the likes of willow and birch hybridise freely and are sexually mature in no time.

My randonm thoughts... For the raised floor area to be caused by a tree root, the root would have to have passed under or throught the kitchen substructure/foundation and then have put on annual increments for a good number of years. That means a healthy root that is getting all it needs, particularly water. So what would it be doing there otherwise? Passing through to somewhere else? You seem to have ruled that out. If it terminates under the kitchen floor it must be getting a steady supply of water. This could be ground water or pipe leakage. If it's the latter, removal of the leakage should arrest the problem. If it's not a solid floor, I can't see how a tree rot could be to blame. A twisted joist wouldn't even produce such localised swelling, you would see it over a larger area. But if you don't even know if it's a solid floor, the first and only thing to do is find that out. If it is, then it's quite a small area that could be cut out after examining and recording the parttern of cracks around the bump. A heavy solid floor slab won't lift locally, nor will a thin reinfoirced one. So the offending area might be a thin unreinforced slab that could be opened up with a bolster an hammer. Whatever's there will reveal itself. A tree root would probably need to be in almost direct contact with the underside of the slab. If I found a root I'd take a sample but I'd be tempted to inject some amount of systemic poison and if this is done at cambial level rather than right into the wood it should kill the root without carrying too much into the above-ground parts of the tree. If it's a leak, that will need to be addressed or the problem could recur and may be doiing other unseen damage. Another thought - protimeters are pretty good at checking moisture levels in concrete. Under vinyl will be a very distorted reading, so the whole floor would need to be stripped and left to air-dry well ventilated for a summer week before any meaningful readings could be taken. A protimeter will only give relative readings unlike the fairly absolute readings they give in wood.

Yes, but I was thinking of solid particles in the air.