Driving northwards through the main Phoenix Park thoroughfare, you note that the chestnuts are growing, some about walnut size already, or so it seems from the moving car. The lime trees are now the stars, with their greenish-yellow flower clusters. Those who care for trees have their worries. For example, a friend who works at landscaping and tree culture sends a copy of Horticultural Week, a journal of the trade, which carries a huge black headline, "DECLINE AND FALL". Under it, one Andrew Finchin declares that there is an alarming decline in oak trees and remarks that there is no greater symbol of the English countryside and natural heritage than "the native English oak", and that the apparent recent decline of the species has become a matter of concern. There is concern on the Continent, too, he writes. There are many factors involved: air pollution, for example, and climatic extremes - such as drought stress. These leave the tree open to disease from insects and root-killing fungi. There is a beetle, too, Agrillus panonicus, which often delivers the coup de grace. Apparently, if you find tarry spots on the bark of your oak, you have a problem with this insect. The references seem to be mostly to Quercus robur, the pedunculate oak; that is the great tree which in maturity stretches out huge branches, often as thick as trunks of neighbouring trees, with no great respect for the laws of gravity. But they endure. Our declared national tree is the other one, the sessile oak or Quercus petraea, which is not specifically mentioned in this article, or not seriously, from memory. But watch out if you have any oaks around your farm or garden. They are precious. In Switzerland, a friend says she often passes farmland where the fields have oaks planted all around: "they used to provide acorns to feed the pigs."
Oaks may have their problems for gardens or small farm areas, but no plot is too small to plant a birch. They don't get out of hand, don't keep light from you or your neighbour, if you choose the right ones. They are graceful, slim, a nymph among the trees. The colour of their bark varies from pure white to white slashed with black, through various shades of orange and cinnamon. The French newspaper La Monde recently carried a whole page on them, with a big illustration in colour of a stag among three birches - his antlers depicted as white birch branches sprouting leaves. A slim variety in a garden will give you pleasure and won't offend the neighbours. Betula pendula fastigiata is just the thing.