Had to take down an Oak about 4 inches thick last weekend as it had recently been blown over and was leaning severely on another. Thankfully it is nice and straight and will make a perfect structural pole and the twiggier branches I will use to make my "Tree of Life" at home. It got me thinking about how old the tree was and what it had already seen.After consulting a few web sites and reference books, I made a few fascinating discoveries. In good conditions an Oak tree should grow 4-5cms (~2") in girth every year for the first 60-80 years of its' life. Over the entire course of an Oak's life it averages out at an inch a year, because the growth rate slows as the tree gets older.
This means that the leaning tree we had to take down was likely between 6 and 8 years old. Not quite a toddler, well not in Oak tree terms anyway. Not when we consider that the English Oak (Quercus robur) has the capacity to live 1,000 years, where we humans only live an average of 1,000 moons. With this thinking, our leaning tree really was a new born. Imagine a tree in Sussex that had stood for over 1,000 years... it would have seen the Saxons being invaded by the Normans, then later the 100 years war where Sussex would have formed the frontline and then even later still the English Civil War where marches went straight through Haywards Heath. Oh if only trees could talk.
Humans typically hit puberty in their teens but an Oak tree doesn't reach this stage until it turns 40.... this means that any Oak tree producing acorns is already four or more decades old - life begins at 40 eh. I am intrigued now to go measure the circumference of the Oaks we have at Rais. I suspect we will be lucky if any are over 100, but it would be good to get some measurements and find out which one is the oldest, which are the pre-pubescent teenagers and if we have any new saplings we need to take particular care of. The deer seem to be rampant at the minute, munching on everything as soon as it unfurls.Yew, however, follows a different and somewhat indecisive growth pattern... it is thought they follow the standard 2.5cm per year for the first 100 years, but then switch to about 1.3cm per year. They can also return to formative rates of growth at almost any point they choose, making it tricky to estimate their age from their circumference. As a rough guide: 2.5m = 100-150yrs; 5m = 300-400yrs; 6m = 500-600yrs; 9m = 850-1000 yrs. So going back with a flexible tape measure this week for sure - the Yew we have right at the entrance to Rais is mahooosive!
