Slow down, you move too fast*

Around the millennium, we planted two oak trees in the line of a new hedge. They are not in a perfect place, suffer from some shading, competition and stress, but I have read that that can be good for their long-term survival. In an established woodland, oak saplings may spend many years in the understorey, struggling with low light levels, putting on very little growth each year. Eventually, one or more of the mature trees shading the patient young will fall, letting in light and causing a growth spurt, racing with others to fill the gap

Trees that follow this slow-then-fast pattern (in the opinion and experience of the forester whose book I read) have the potential to live for centuries. On the other hand, he says, trees that have an easy start, with access to ample light, live fast and die young. Our little orchard hardly qualifies as mature woodland, but neither the trees we planted nor this volunteer have an easy life. This one has reached 2-3M without benefit of treeguard or any quelling of the surrounding overgrown hedge

Blipper ceridwen has taught me about marcescence, demonstrated rather neatly here by the young tree clinging on to its leaves, while its parent in the background is truly bare. The old tree is hollow and its highest branches bear only woodpeckers, buzzards and kites. It has been slowly dying for the quarter-century we have known it, but it's quite possible it will still be here 40 years, on or more. A protracted childhood is mirrored in a drawn-out death

Today we received a picture of our grandson sitting in a high chair, looking expectant, and another one of him working on the practicalities of using a spoon (no, he's not getting any solid food yet). From the oak's perspective, we impatient humans are such hasty creatures 

*Paul Simon