It’s tree following time again!
You may recall that I have decided to follow an avenue of Lime trees in Rookery Park, my local park. The avenue has been described as a ‘knotted perversion’ by a friend of mine. I’m not sure if I should thank him, but it’s the closest thing we’ve got to a name this year.
The wider view
Here we are, looking down the avenue from pretty much the same spot as last month, and things look just about the same. It’s all a bit muddier and a bit wetter, but that’s the only change from this vantage point. The park was deserted apart from a couple of chaps taking their early morning exercise, a stark contrast to earlier at in the weekend when we’d popped round with the kids to burn off some energy.
Upon closer inspection
The bases of the trees are throwing out lots of shoots, as lime trees have a tendency to do. These shoots are occasionally trimmed off to keep the trunk clear; you can see where this has been done in the past (although not too clearly in the photo, I’m afraid).
The buds of the trees look healthy and plump, but still tightly sealed and not quite ready for opening yet:
Nearly all of the trees have a generous covering of lichen. I have no idea what sort, but I did recently buy a book on the subject. Maybe I’ll be able to tell you later in the year. It’s all growing on one side of the trees (the west side, interestingly).
Looking up through the leafless canopy, there are quite a lot of tangled, broken branches. The photo below is more of a silhouette than I intended, but it gives a rough idea. Whilst the bases of the trees have been occasionally tidied up, the trunks haven’t been cleared for some time. They clearly have been at some point in the past, but the maintenance of the upper trunk and canopy of the avenue has evidently been neglected of late.
Finally, another face. This one is a little more faded than last month’s:
I think it looks like a smirk, but it’s triangle eyes and stitched up mouth also give it a rather devilish menace. A devilish smirk perhaps.
That’s all for this month’s tree following. To see more trees, or to take part, head over to Squirrelbasket. See you next time!
That’s an interesting face painted on the tree. At least it’s a bit inventive.
Here I’ve only found classical smileys painted on trees. Happy smileys and sad smileys. No creative innovations here…
Yes, it’s certainly interesting. There’s one on every tree down the avenue – I’m hoping to work my way down them all as we go through the year!
Interesting to see the lichen on these trees. I guess that it’s on the west side as that’s where it gets the prevailing rain and wind.
That makes a lot of sense!
That’s a lovely avenue of limes! Nice to get a closer look at them too. The lichen is interesting, I find lichens very difficult to identify. Hope your book helps!
Thanks! So far, I still can’t tell you much in the way of lichens. At least there’s lots of room for improvement!
The park where the tree I am following lives is also far muddier this month than last, I put it down to a combination of the amount of rain we have ‘enjoyed’ and the fact that the warmer (ish) weather means more children are out playing.
I think you’re probably right.
Incidentally, I’ve just noticed that I put the wrong link on (to February’s post, instead of March’s) – I wondered why there were comments popping up on this post!