I spotted this oak growing in a bed of ivy outside a neighbour's house. For many years they trimmed the oak whenever they trimmed the ivy. You can imagine how that appealed to me.
So today I went, with permission, to collect it.
I know harry H has the article about summer collecting but I haven't always succeeded with it, whereas I find oaks collected in winter tend to survive. More about this tree and survival later...
Here's the bed with the tree - can you see it?
20210129_132938 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrThis is what I have seen on my dog walks:
20210129_132943 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrI cleared around it:
20210129_134647 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrAnd started digging. The saw on the right is about a foot long, so I dug down only about a foot before I was through the topsoil and hit the impenetrable red clay layer that is under this part of Kent. Nothing seems to grow in the red clay. So when it is shallow that usually means a shallow root system.
20210129_142930 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrMy view is that oaks will always have a tap root that is exactly in line with the trunk. So I dig as deep as I can around the tree. Then I pick a side where there is good access and I dig a tunnel that aims straight at the lowest part of the tap root that I can reach, knowing I will find it.
Here's the tunnel I dug
20210129_145045 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrAnd Bingo! here is the taproot:
20210129_151431 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrOK you can't see it as it is buried in the soil - but it is there - right in the middle of the pic, exactly where I thought it would be.
20210129_151435 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrYou need to dig carefully, and I find a small trowel is essential to create the hole. I put the saw into the hole for scale:
20210129_145057 by BrendanR2012, on Flickr
20210129_145101 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrsOn this dig the hole ended up being much bigger because the soil was completely filled with stones. My saw couldn't get through the tap root without fouling on a stone. Cut, move. Cut, move. Etc etc. It took ages.
In the end my little hole was a massive excavation.
But in the end...
Ta Daa!
20210129_154647 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrBut there is a twist.
The oak was not just a single oak. On lifting it I suspected it was entwined with another oak (hosepipe coupler for scale).
20210129_154715 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrTurns out it was 2 trees. One obviously much younger;
20210129_160853 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrAnd then the oak that I was after.
Dammit!
After all that work I came away with almost ZERO roots. :
20210129_155400 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrAll the lateral roots were on the younger tree. This beast had roots that head straight down. Straight through the impenetrable red clay layer. I bet it has roots surfacing in New Zealand.
So I potted it up in a deep pot. I kept the soil that I had carefully removed. With oaks you alway keep the old soil as it has the critical mycorrhizal fungi. Mix it in with the free draining substrate (cat litter).
As the tree was in clay with a bit of a loamy textrure I didn't want to keep a lot of it but I still mixed it at about 1 - 20 parts. I like to do a layer of CL, then a sprinkling of the old soil, next layer, next sprinkle etc. The concentration of the old soil in a thin layer is better than a dispersal throughout the mix, as the fungi need a critical mass to start reproducing.
20210129_163549 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrHoe do you spell inverse taper?
Nevermind, I can cope with it because can you see that bark! Deep fissures, craggy and OLD!
20210129_163712 by BrendanR2012, on FlickrWith those few roots I give it 50/50 odd on surviving at best. Even it it lives it will take me 10 years to develop the roots. That siad, the bark on this tree is work another 10 years.
I so desperately want it to live.
