Trees Gallery - Here and There

Here and there in the Lake District

This is the Chinese Bridge, spanning the River Derwent at the southern end of Derwentwater, leading to the boardwalk through the shore, and eventually on to Cat Bells. There are many fine trees and shrubs in the area, often standing proud in the landscape: ash, beech, silver birch, hazel, oak - sessile and pedunculate, sycamore, willow.

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Acer pseudoplatanus acer - maple; pseudoplatanus - false plane, referring to a superficial similarity of leaves and bark to those of plane trees (genus platanus)

Sycamore

Not native to Britain, but they have been here for many years and are well established across the Lake District. These broadleaf trees can grow to 35m and live for 400 years. Twigs are pink-brown and hairless. Small, green-yellow flowers hang in spikes, or 'racemes'. After pollination by wind and insects, female flowers develop into distinctive winged fruits known as samaras..

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Betula pendula betula - birch, possibly from betu, meaning tar or bitumen, which can be extracted from the tree, pendula - hanging down (L.)

Silver birch

Silver birch trees growing near the Bowder Stone in Borrowdale. Very common across the Lake District. Leaves are light green, small and triangular-shaped with a toothed edge, which fade to yellow in autumn. Monoecious both male and female flowers (catkins) are found on the same tree catkins emerge from April to May, the male catkins long, yellow-brown, hanging in groups of two to four, like lambs' tails. Female catkins are smaller, short, bright green and erect.

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Myrica gale myrica - Greek from 'myron', meaning 'perfume', or 'myrike', the Classical name for tamarisk; gale probably derived from Anglo-Saxon, Old English or German, 'gagel' or 'gagol', a vernacular name for Bog-myrtle.

Bog myrtle

A.k.a. sweet willow, Dutch myrtle, sweetgale, flea-wood, candle berries, bayberry, wax myrtle and golden withy. A deciduous shrub growing to 2 m. The leaves are spirally arranged, simple, with a crinkled or finely toothed margin. The dioecious male and female catkins on separate plants red–orange flowers are catkins. The fruit is a small, waxy drupe. It typically grows in acidic peat bogs, and to cope with these difficult nitrogen-poor growing conditions, the roots have nitrogen-fixing actinobacteria which enable the plants to grow. The foliage is a traditional insect repellent.

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Quercus petraea quercus - Latin name for oak, derived from the Proto-Indo-European root kwerkwu; petraea - Latin, meaning of rocky places though some authorities say it is named after Lord Robert James Petre, an 18th-century English patron of botany and horticulture, which seems more plausible.

Sessile oak - Latin sessile - stalkless, referring to the acorns being directly attached to twigs at their base, without a peduncle

. I think this is q. petraea, rather than q. robur, but without leaves and acorns it is difficult to decide - I really need to make more detailed inspection. The two species hybridise as well, making identification more difficult. This specimen has an unusual large burr on one branch, with more burrs in the more usual place at the base of the trunk. Some good woodturning stock one day!

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Quercus robur quercus - Latin name for oak, derived from the Proto-Indo-European root kwerkwu; robur - Latin for strength, hard wood or oak-wood.

Oak

This one is probably q. robur, possibly q. petraea. I find it difficult to tell, particularly without leaves or acorns to help. Leaves and blossom are just unfurling. Robur leaves emerge about 3 weeks before petraea, another reason for thinking this is robur, as it is early in the season.

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Quercus robur quercus - Latin name for oak, derived from the Proto-Indo-European root kwerkwu; robur - Latin for strength, hard wood or oak-wood.

Oak

Again, these are probably q. robur, growing in an open area at Mayburgh Henge, site of a neolithic stone circle near Penrith, now under the care of English Heritage. I must return to photograph some distinctive ash trees on the earthbank circle surrounding the henge.

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Quercus robur quercus - Latin name for oak, derived from the Proto-Indo-European root kwerkwu; robur - Latin for strength, hard wood or oak-wood.

Oak

A fine oak viewed from the terrace of Blackwell, a beautiful Arts and Crafts house near the shores of Lake Windermere.

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Rhododendron rhodon - Greek name for rose; dendron - Greek for tree.
arboreum arbor - Latin for tree - this species tends to grow larger and more tree-like than other rhododendrons.

Tree rhododendron

This is probably r. arboreum, an evergreen shrub or small tree growing to 12 m high and wide, with a showy display of bright red flowers. A native of Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Thailand.

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