David Humphries

I don’t think these are fruiting bodies. They look woody to me. Perhaps cankered burrs.

Some big arsed London planes in Russell Square. Imagine LB Camden are all over the branches from inspection POV. Would be interesting to know if the placement of benches is random or strategic in terms of location outside or under canopy branches.

Oh I don't know, they sometimes have interesting guests?

Yeah I saw that too Gary, not entirely sure on what the Americans do in terms of Massaria management but the article suggests the tree hadn’t been inspected for almost 2 years and you have to wonder about the bench being sited directly under low lateral spreading London plane branches.

If you do see Pete this week, could you share this image with him, I spoke briefly with him about how the foresters in the Basque cover their fresh (pollard) cuts with moss matts. He said he hadn't heard of it before and seemed quite intrigued.

Yeah Pete was there sharing his vast experience helping with the guided walk and supporting the current incumbent.

shame, you missed a good one, though a little over subscribed (62 attendees i think) We were there looking at other issues like deer impact/management, doormice populations and end product so didn't actually focus on ADB for too long. I don't remember specific replacement species being mentioned (may have missed it as I have a tendency to wonder off) but as you'll know species diversity is quite key to woodland management and associated biodiversity so rather than move toward a monoculture of hazel there will be the opportunity to replace ash with something else, lime, willow, field maple, alder......other

Fascinating day with the Ancient Tree Forum, Suffolk Wildlife Trust & Small Woods Association at Bradfield Woods yesterday. There for talks on Suffolk's woodland history and pollarding/coppicing and then a guided walk learning about the challenges of managing an 800 year old coppice woodland. Significant concerns at lack of resilience to ash die back. The guys that work the wood think that ash will take a 90% hit in the next 10 years. Will be interesting to see which species gets planted to replace the ash and supplement the hazel in Bradfield over the next couple of decades.

Yeah relatively unusual to find that type of fruiting in an agricultural field as the mass of mycelium in the soil would be too disturbed to grow and put on such large fb’s. Agreed, eating unknown species is not clever.

Sizeable fruitbodies. Not sure they are ‘giant puffballs’ (Calvatia gigantea) as they tend to be pure white and not scaly/dimpled like these. Possibly another puffball species. Sounds daft, but I take it that you looked underneath and ruled out they had gills? Did ya take one for the pot ?

Which tree species?

Been a Spurs fan since the eighties and have been to a couple of cup finals with them (best being ‘91 FA cup) but still coming to terms with how the actual fuch they are in the biggest club competition in world football. Poch is a pretty good gaffer and there are a few pretty decent players in that squad but Champions League Final?!? Been a great run from the lilywhites. Liverpools result was epic too, really enjoyed that piece of theatre. Uefa not gonna like having ‘potentially’ 4 English finalists in their two cup competitions. Suspect we will see a change in the EPL coefficient in the next couple of years.

Hard or soft bracket? former G. pfeifferi latter G. resinaceum Think it looks more the latter

Sorry to hear of your hassle. Totally undeserved, unmerited and unwarranted, I sympathise with you. Social media and public reaction to tree work is an absolute disgrace at times and full of ignorant uneducated and ill informed fools. Sadly stoked by very poorly managed public trees like the Sheffield debacle and privately owned trees like on development sites which are getting netted. That can only change by a continued line of education and information to the public as to what’s happening to the trees and why. (Planning notifications etc..) People like trees and all the good they do us at a conscious and subconsciously level and get upset when what they see those trees disappear from their treescape, often not replaced. Playing the advocate of the one that should not be named, had the tree had any structural survey before being condemned? Yes it is significantly decayed, (it appears quite hollow in the stem) oddly enough trees actually go through that process in their lifespan and can remain standing and even leaning like that for many decades. How were the roots and trunk base? Your original picture ‘appears’ to show a vascularly healthy tree with full canopy and buds and also strong vital active outer sapwood layer. Had any consideration been given to reduce the tree to help mitigate the ‘potential’ risk of collapse? I think I’d be disappointed if I had that tree in a neighbouring garden and it got taken down.

Excellent, thanks for taking the time to share Rob, looked like an inspiring trip.

Slightly different machine and I’m coming from the local authority perspective so don’t pay for the calibration out of my own pocket, but do have to justify the annual cost of calibration to senior management. The PD series flashes up that it requires calibration after a thousand drills or a callender year, which ever comes first. (Usually the latter for us) We use the Resi PD400 a fair bit and the graphs do go in to reports for where we are condemning or retaining a tree. Having an in date calibration certificate as an appendix to a report gives the report more weight in my opinion. Also gives us confidence in knowing the motors are being looked at and service where necessary. I would think from your perspective (as you’ve already alluded to) it will depend on how often you utilise it as a tool.

Suspect this beech union would fail if one or both of these natural braces were compromised. Would be fascinating to sever one and see how long the union withstood the load.

Milly, thinking she’s a lioness hiding in the Serengeti

Nice

Tried getting on but already booked, met Giovanni in Poland a few years ago, very engaging. Hopefully catch it at conference.

It is as Nepia suggests, Ps ?

Some nice examples

Great edit Reg, an easy watch. Particularly like the reflection of the stick falling in the window @ 2:50 and the cat running away ! What makes you choose the battery topper for the stripping?

Poked it a few times over a number of years, so had a good idea of the level of decay.