Monday 19 November 2018

Veteran Tree and Fungi Walk




Having had my interest in fungi piqued by this Roger Phillips foray I booked my wife and I in on a Herts and Middx Wildlife Trust Veteran Tree and Fungi Walk held at Panshanger Park
As it was an organised event we met away from the usual car park and then got underway with Alan, David and Laura.




We had a cold but gloriously bright morning for it and started near where there stood a beautiful country house and orangery overlooking the lake. My wife and I often walk around the area but we usually walk near the lake so the walk headed into a  part that we don't often frequent



We stopped and looked at lots of trees and fungi so I've picked out a few notables. This unusual Sycamore appears to be growing out of an old dead stump, perhaps a windblown seed? 


 This Beech loving fungi is Brittle Cinder (Kretzschmaria deusta) and Alan explained that this causes spalting through the wood which makes for attractive carved objects, similar to this lovely spalted firewood project that I've recently finished albeit with Birch.


We stopped to measure this Sweet Chestnut's girth which came out at 5.23 metres which is apparently a decent measurement in veteran terms.


 



In between the tree observation we did find several mushrooms, maybe a  Frosty Funnel (Clitocybe phyllophila) at the top, a Russula in the middle and an Amanita below?


This mighty Pendunculate Oak was a sight to see, even though the tip was missing due to a lightning  strike. It's age is estimated to be between 450-500 years (to put that in context it probably would have germinated during Henry VIII's reign). It's girth was 7. 94 metres which puts it in the upper echelons of veteran trees.


 We spent a bit of time in this wooded area and got  given information about how trees adapt to old age and their environments, for instance the three parts to an Oak's life cycle. The picture (above left) shows a tree that has developed 'ramshorns' as it attempts to grow over a wound. 


 As we emerged from the wooded part of our walk we entered an area that my wife and I were more familiar with, or so I thought. As impressive as the mighty Oak was I was taken by the presence of two stands of young English Elms (decimated across the country by Dutch Elm disease) with the mother tree that they probably suckered from. I'd not noticed them before and when we were asked what variety it was I was reticent to say.


 Mistletoe features prominently in the park but I noticed a small but perfectly formed specimen at head height, perfect for a quick peck on the cheek. Nearby was a naturally occurring Lime, as opposed to a planted one. The Lime was the sixteenth indigenous tree variety I saw, I say indigenous because the area around the house was landscaped and as an example there are non-natives such as a small stand of False Acacias nearby.









And some more cheeky specimens, maybe Milking Bonnet (Mycena galopus) at the top,  and possibly another Bonnet of some sort (growing on the measured Sweet Chestnut) in the middle? And Turkey Tails (Trametes versicolor) at the bottom? 

 Now by the lake edge we saw some pollarded (and then subsequently neglected) Oaks and a branch that a tree has deemed worthy of dropping, and did! We also saw several Ring-necked Parakeets which are being seen more and more in our area.

 

One particular example had grown round a lot of barbed wire  with possibly common inkcap mushrooms below. Even though the trees had been pollarded they were still impressive and apparently it prevents trees from ageing as quickly as a maiden (untouched) tree.

 

Here we have a good example of an Oak healing over the spot were a branch was removed but the tree is also showing signs of acute oak decline, a disease of more mature trees.

 

 And my wife was pleased to spot an example of a Beech tree's 'ramshorn' repair of a wound, which was later confirmed in a talk about this stand which also included a monolith tree which is basically just the trunk which is left to benefit nature. We also saw a good example a little distance away of brown rot which produces punky wood, often used to smoke hides with.

 

I spotted these parasol mushrooms which turned out to be Shaggy Parasols (Macrolepoita rhacodes). Jane, one of the course attendees, helped out with the ID saying that they have white stems as opposed to Parasols (Macrolepiota procera) which have scaley stems.

 

 We chanced upon a decent sized Artists Bracket Fungus (Ganoderma applanatum) which often favours Beech and apparently likes to grow low down, whereas the Beefsteak Fungus (fistulina hepatica) tend to be a little higher on the Panshanger estate Oaks, a spent example of which is shown above right. it was pointed out that if a bracket fungus is vertical on a fallen tree you know it came down with said tree because brackets grow horizontally.


We had completed a three hour meandering circular walk and the last thing I saw of note was a Common Mallow (Malva sylvestris) that had snapped close to the ground and yet still had two decent blooms showing in mid November.

What an enjoyable wander we had been on, I've learnt some stuff that I previously didn't know which is always a good thing but it also shows you how much you don't know too!

By the way, the sixteen varieties of indigenous trees noted today were Pendunculate Oak, Hornbeam, Beech, English Elm, Lime, Holly, Alder, Silver Birch, Cherry, Larch, Willow, Sweet Chestnut, Yew, Elder, Sycamore and Scots Pine.




Saturday 17 November 2018

Spalted Firewood Stuff



As detailed in this kuksa blog I had the good fortune to see some spalted birch in a bag of firewood in my local Waitrose and once I'd finished my Kuksa I had to decide what to make out of the remaining wood.



The kuksa was the first thing I wanted to attempt and the blog details the difficulties this kiln dried wood can present.


I had a small and knobbly but highly patterned piece that was waste from the kuksa. I was due to drop my eldest son off in Manchester to start his university adventure and I had a  last minute light bulb moment. I would cut the piece in half, put in a marathon sanding session to both flatten and level the pieces and then carve two hearts, the idea being that my son had one to hang up as did we as a reminder that we were thinking about him whilst away.


Whilst I would have liked just a little longer to refine the shape I was happy to have got them ready in time. I also made and posted one of two key rings from the remaining heart waste.

 

Next up was a slightly a long thin length that had a slight twist to it. I decided to attempt a net needle which I started off at home and  finished on a recent overnighter.


I was quite chuffed that I'd got my eye in to avoid the slight twist but the finished needle still had a very slight bend in it. The bend was minimal and wouldn't have stopped it functioning but I wanted to try and remove it and steam was to be the answer.

I have made myself a wood steamer but it seemed overkill for something a few inches long so I tied the needle between two off cuts and put it through a hot dishwasher cycle which did the job. I finished all the pieces with walnut oil except this one which I tried linseed oil on.


When I started the kuksa I also did a little work on a spoon too, it was now time to finish this off. Six done and onto the next...

 

The shape of the off cut rather dictated the spoon orientation, the patterning was slightly better on the underside but I was still pleased with the outcome. As detailed in the kuksa blog I was a bit concerned about overworking it and bits falling off so I left the neck of the spoon a little thicker than I'd like but I'm still happy with it.

 

And onto the final off cut which was arguably the runtiest of the lot. I'd envisaged making a basic camp butter knife but the dark area on in the above picture was a natural depression so I changed tack and decided to utilise this as a bowl on a second spoon. Like the other spoon I had a preference for the underside spalting but of course the depression dictated the orientation.


I got pretty much all the shaping done and then started making the bowl with a crook spoon and it went from fairly plain to the gorgeous oval shaped markings that thankfully didn't disappear as I finished up.


Now my patience with woodworking isn't usually that good, along the lines of if a spoon isn't finished in fifteen minutes it will get the 'Bored now' treatment. As this was desired spalted wood I felt the urge to stick with the various projects to completion.

Should you wish to see a couple of guys making exceptional items I'd suggest visiting  Jon Mac's blog and the primitive point blog