A long hot summer
As I write this the first real rain is falling and it's enough to fill the water butts for the first time in many weeks. It has been just too hot to work in the wood even though there is always work needing doing. Its has been especially hard on the flora and fauna there and many of the trees have started to lose their leaves early: it is a way for them to conserve moisture by preventing evaporation from the leaves. For trees that are already suffering from the effects of old age or fungal attack the additional heat stress has the effect of accelerating their decline. Our main oak tree has been on the wain for many years, each Autumn it hosts impressive bracket fungus, a sign of the rot within. This Summer the fungus has multiplied and there is deep crack now running up the trunk. The tree is slowly dying, which is showing in the thinning canopy and t yellowing of the leaves. It is a...
