Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Trees in urban gardens
As a general rule, trees are a good thing and it is easy to understand why there is plenty of support for planting as many as possible and preserving what we have. On the other hand, there are plenty of circumstances when a particular tree or a group of trees is very far from a good thing. Because trees come in such a wide range of species and sizes, it behoves tree owners to be careful in their choice of which trees to plant or to conserve.
Moreover, it is important to realise that not all trees that we have in Harringay were planted by some human agency. Walking in ladder streets I often see ash or sycamore trees that plainly began as seedlings growing in cracks by walls. In my view, any house owner would be wise to have those things out as soon as they appear. If the roots won’t come out, then cut them flush with the ground and poison the stump with glyphosate. It’s no good dreaming that they will grow into a beautiful asset.
In the 1990s I was living abroad and a gardening company looked after my garden while I was away. After a tree blew down in a gale, the gardener suggested a replacement. What about a tulip tree he asked. In my ignorance (thinking that perhaps he meant a magnolia) I agreed. When 15 years later, I finally returned, the tulip tree was already 30 feet tall and I finally did some research – in fact the research was made easier by the fact that my wife’s uncle in Pennsylvania had a tulip tree growing by his typical wooden house. The trunk was at least three feet in diameter and it soared far above the surrounding tree canopy. According to Wikipedia, this tree is a native of Appalachia where it can grow over 150 feet tall. Obviously, this is completely inappropriate in an urban garden however large it might be. My gardener clearly was as inexperienced as I was. That tree had to go and I quickly got rid of it.
It is not just tulip trees that are wrong for urban gardens. The aforementioned ash and sycamore can also grow so big that they can completely fill a typical ladder garden and overshadow neighbouring gardens. The picture below shows a beautifully shaped sycamore which would be an asset on Hadrian’s Wall. In fact it is in a tiny garden of about 60 square metres. The tree canopy itself is larger than that so it dominates both its own location and two or three gardens to its north. As it happens, this is not a problem for me but I should not wish to have a neighbour to my south who allowed such a tree to become established.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Hi Sabrina.
As Clive Carter usefully explains "What Do They Know" website has many advantages. When I spotted that Haringey was asking people to write to them directly I complained. It made no difference. And Nobody explained why.A similar thing happened when I bought my first digital camera and began posting photos on Flickr of Haringey's dumped streets, pavements and alleys. One of my aims was to encourage other residents to take their own photos. And also to encourage Haringey staff to seek ways to improve street cleanliness.
To be fair, I think they did. Several thousand photos showed that it used to be a lot worse.
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Permalink Reply by Martin (Woodside) on
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On the subject of trees....
Twice in the last month, two men wearing green Trees For Cities jumpers have been taking water out of a fire hydrant outside of my house and filling up a tank on the back of their Cabstar van. They seem legitimate, even using blue-coated plumbing connectors, although the water they are removing will not be metered. I wonder if Thames Water has some sort of agreement with this organisation to remove water via hydrants?.
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Permalink Reply by AndrewAW1 on
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Trees for Cities are Haringey's partner for the Trees for Streets initiative so I wouldn't be surprised if there was some kind of arrangement.
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Thanks Andrew, I thought it looked legit.
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Permalink Reply by Dick Harris on
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Walking up Beresford this morning I was delighted to see a tree-shredding team bringing out all the bits of a sycamore tree right through a house from its back garden. It's the only solution when a house-holder finds one of these unsuitable monsters making life miserable in several adjoining gardens. Well done you. I didn't stop to ask how they intended to kill the stump. No prizes for guessing.
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Well, disagreed.
Wow! This is so sad to read...
There are millions different solutions not to get rid of the whole plant - respecting the micro-environment living on and around it. Usually, any proper arborist acknowledges that they fell trees because it’s cheaper to them - not because it’s the most environmentally friendly solution.
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