including Beech Bottom Dyke and Sandridge Road Wastes
In the 1930s, St Albans Council erected a combined bus shelter and public toilets in the south corner of Heath Field. Sometime in the early 1980s, the building was demolished, leaving some laurel bushes which were common landscaping accompaniments to such facilities.
Continue reading “A sweet Smell of Success”
On Sunday morning, 18th April 2021, one of the Sandridge Road ornamental cherry trees found the weight of blossom on a branch too much to bear; it fell across the footpath and most of the road. Fortunately, nobody on the pavement or road came to any harm and that it was a Sunday morning when traffic was relatively light.
Continue reading “Breaking News on Sandridge Road”
We have now been in ‘Lockdown’ since March 23rd and since then the Heath has been very much busier than normal. Sunny weather has encouraged walkers, joggers and cyclists (often with children) to take advantage of what the Heath offers – it’s just like a weekend every day. The recently installed interpretation boards are also getting attention. The bluebells in Beech Bottom Dyke are also worth seeing, especially at the end near the railway.
While it’s good to see the Heath playing its part in providing a distraction from worries about Covid 19 and its consequences, it’s also apparent that there is less careless litter than might be expected for high summer. O’Conner the maintenance contractors have generally done a good job in clearing bins and cutting grass. Sadly, John O’Conner, the founder of the company, died in March partly as a consequence of Covid 19 infection.
This large tree fell on a path during Storm Ciara on Sunday, February 9th. The path is the second on the right after entering Spinney Lane (see arrow on map alongside) and it is blocking the path, unless you are really determined to get through! Now cleared! It was on the big side for the Friends to clear, so the Council has been informed. No doubt they have plenty of debris to clear – hopefully they will be able to get to it soon.
More substantial trees have since fallen as shown below:
Photos: PC
Thank you everybody who helped with our Action Day on November 17th 2019
A lovely sunny but cold November Action day attracted a good number of helpers, who:
1 and 2 Collected litter and other rubbish – including a sleeping bag
3 cleared a section of hedge in Heath Farm Lane
4 cleared a substantial fallen branch close to Luton (Spinney) Lane.
Early morning photos from the Lower Field, Bernards Heath. Photos: MN.
Starting from outside, the red-brown bark surrounds yellow sapwood with brown heartwood in the middle. The bark brings the leaves’ products of photosynthesis down to build a new layer of the sapwood each year while the sapwood conducts water upwards from the roots to the whole tree canopy. Heartwood is dead sapwood and only contributes strength to the trunk and branches. The proportions are different in branches (below).
The bark started to heal over the stumps, but before this was complete, the wood had rotted. Bark can only lay down new wood on a sound surface. Poplar is not rated as a ‘durable’ wood, meaning that dead wood does not resist decay well.
Going back to the second picture, on the left is a branch stump which successfully healed over. The blackened cut surface was partially exposed by a felling cut. In contrast, on the right is a pocket of rot which started when a branch was cut off. It eventually closed over, but never quite healed properly, as can be seen (below). A slight ‘witness’ occurs to this day in the bark surface, although, without seeing the cut stump, it would not be apparent.
Oh, you want to know how old the tree was? The picture (below) shows the rings marked (very faint) in 10’s
They add up to 110, give or take a few. So the tree started life about 1910. The two healed-over branches were cut some 50 years ago, around the time that the old fire station was built and possibly connected with clearing low-growing vegetation in the vicinity of the access road.
Lastly, a piece of branch from up in the tree canopy below shows some really good growths of moss and lichens (pronounced litch-ens or like-ens). Lichens are combinations of a fungus and an algae living as one organism.
On the left is of the north-facing and damper side and on the right, the south-facing and drier side.
Roger Miles, Heath Tree Warden
Until a few days ago, just to the left of and in front of the old fire station were two trees,
a sycamore and a very large poplar. Probably a hybrid black poplar, to be more precise
(to left in picture above, leaves shown below).
This young Beech tree was felled just off Harpenden Road on or around 29th July. We have been planting trees on the Heath over the winter, so it is disheartening when this happens. Do you know anything about it? – if so, contact FoBH chairman by clicking FoBH Mail in the right-hand column.
On the left above the tree as it was and on the right the location. The tree was cleanly sawn off with a handsaw and left as shown.
Images from Google Street View dated April 2019 and Google maps.
This large ash tree recently came down partially blocking this path to the WW2 water tank, which can just be seen in the background. The tree broke off near the top of the roots, see inset image. Fortunately, it did not fall towards the tank, which is still threatened by a large sycamore only inches away. The Council has agreed to deal with the ash tree.
Continue reading “Ash Trees feel the strain”