31 July 2022

Nature

Nature is pretty resilient and its principal urge is to live, to exist, to reproduce. Consequently, it came as no real surprise to me that our old horse chestnut tree has shown signs of regrowth. Green stirrings on the stump.

You may recall that we hired tree surgeons to take the tree down in May, leaving only a stump that we could use as an extra bird table. Go here. I could have asked for the stump to be removed or for "tree killer" to be poured into drilled holes but I didn't want that. Ofttimes when you fell a tree, the shock is sufficient to bring an abrupt halt to any future growth 

Today I cut off any regrowth emerging from the remaining trunk and applied weed killer to the greenery thrusting  upwards from around the horizontally sawn plane where the fatal chainsaw cut was made in May. I am hoping that that will do the job of inhibiting or preventing any future growth though I would not put much money on that prospect.

Meantime, congratulations to England's women on beating Germany in the final of the Euros 2022.  You did your country proud and I am not ashamed to say that when the final whistle blew, I had tears in my eyes. An authentic moment of mingled joy and pride. England 2 Germany 1.  Brilliant and well-deserved.

24 comments:

  1. I can picture a nice pot filled with flowers sitting on that stump! We had a tree removed (I am guessing 20 years ago) and it still sends up shoots in my garden from time to time! I watched the highlights of the game and those goals were terrific! My daughter and son played years ago when they were in school and I loved going to games. Congrats to England! Well done!

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    1. It was only a game of football but it has given this nation a lift. The women done good. Thanks for the tree warning.

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  2. Nature is surprisingly resilient, which will be good when we all die because of climate change. Mother Earth will adapt and go on ....

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    1. This will be known throughout the universe as The Planet of Cockroaches and Rats.

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  3. I had an ash tree that did the same thing. It kept on sending up new shoots.

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  4. You might have to repeat the cut off and apply weed killer routine a few times before the tree actually gives up.

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    1. I didn't realise you were a professional tree surgeon River! Thanks for your free advice.

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    2. I used a smallish pruning saw to cut down a 25 foot shrub in my daughter's yard some years ago. Took me about two months. Then a few months of pulling off new shoots and applying weedkiller. All that's left now is a two foot high dead stump. I'm thinking of adding a few "fairy doors" and some "fairyland" items around the base.

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  5. Are you going to nail wooden board or something on top of the stump, or is the surface of the stump itself the bird table?
    When my parents still had their allotment, my Dad used to hack at their fruit trees rather indiscriminately. He almost killed a mirabelle, which greatly upset my sister. The tree made a miraculous recovery.

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    1. The surface of the stump is the bird table.

      P.S. I notice you made no reference to England's victory!

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    2. That is because I am simply not interested in football, be it men's or women's. Sorry!

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  6. Perhaps I should forward your post to my nasty neighbours.

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    1. We will continue to receive our post here thank you very much. We don't even know Mr Curmudgeon and his wife Ena.

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  7. Great win for the Lionesses. Let's have more free live football on the BBC. It doesn't matter what division. Just make it free for everyone to watch.

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    1. I agree with you there. They have taken live football away from ordinary fans. There's no way I will ever pay money to "SKY" or "BT".

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  8. If they only showed the Vanarama League it would be something to watch.

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    1. They could show some lads kicking a tin can around in a cobbled street.

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  9. Same with the cherry laurel we had cut down here. Life- there is just no stopping it.

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  10. We remove a lot of trees from fence rows on the farm and because it is labor intensive, we don't want to have to repeat it often. Thus we use a chemical named Tordon here in the States to apply to the stump. It does a good job of killing it with a single application. But it is pretty nasty stuff so precautions need to be made. Also, if there are roots of multiple trees grafted together underground and out of sight, you will soon find out when it kills all the trees.

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  11. And Hull won the day before. Which result pleases you most?

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    1. Always Hull City first, England second to me.

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  12. Mother nature will outlast us all thank goodness.

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    1. As my brother Simon has proved, we are only here for a short while. Nature is forever.

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Mr Pudding welcomes all genuine comments - even those with which he disagrees. However, puerile or abusive comments from anonymous contributors will continue to be given the short shrift they deserve. Any spam comments that get through Google/Blogger defences will also be quickly deleted.

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