It’s been a near-perfect planting season – at least for spring planters like me. The heavens have been generous with timely rain; our streams are racing as I have rarely seen them. In the New Forest the ponies are splashing through gleaming puddles that are almost ponds. The first thrilling flush of foliage is filling out while the flowing trees, cherries and crab-apples and especially magnolias, grab all the attention in the landscape.
Aren’t our public bodies too austere in their tree-planting taste? Our planted woods could do with more variety. We don’t lack autumn colours. Oaks alone produce a medley. But I always plant a scattering of Prunus avium, our native cherry, even among conifers. Recently in Wales I have planted a scattering of Norway maples, cheerful with their lime-green flowers in April and reliable bright yellow leaves in late autumn.
Forestry is a deeply conservative art-form. It relies on centuries of experience; anything original is considered dangerously risky when the final reckoning is fifty or a hundred years in the future. You will live with your mistakes for the rest of your life. Gardening of course works in a much shorter timeframe. The safest planting of all is annuals.
