Centuries of sunlight have solidified into this beech’s massive presence, which creates its own woodland world. I stand beneath the grandeur of its shaded columns in veneration. But it was not always this way. This great beast was made to bend to the will of generations of commoners, lopped for the humblest of produce, a 10-yearly crop of firewood. It was a labourer, a working tree.
Until the mid 19th century, that is, when cropping ceased. Today, 20 poles, each the size of a mature tree, thrust skywards from the lumpen head of this ancient pollard. And around its great girth, in its crevices and creases, the microclimate changes with the compass. Dominating the trunk’s north-west curve, like a coral outcrop, the bracket fungus Perenniporia fraxinea fans out dramatically in three layers more than 120cm wide. For 20 years I’ve watched this veteran grow so large that its soft, skin-coloured underbelly is now punctured by a million tiny spore-producing pores.
To the north, failing root buttresses are covered by clusters of clam-shaped southern brackets, Ganoderma australe, showering everything in a decorative cinnamon dust. The roots were damaged by compaction 30 years ago and three poles are crumbling away, pock-marked by great spotted woodpeckers. Beneath this canopy-gap, I watch a comma flirting with the October sunshine.
Over on the east side the morning warmth generates a frenzy of fungus gnats scenting the brackets. They scatter abruptly as a glossy hoverfly muscles in, investigating a pungent brown ooze exuding from a bark lesion.
The tree’s main public face is its south side though few these days look up 3m to see the graffiti carved a generation ago. Perhaps, like me, those earlier visitors were drawn to the apparent permanence of this tree and clambered up, like axemen of old, to fix their own place in time.
It is exactly 800 years since the Forest Charter of Henry III fixed the forest boundaries and protected common rights, including the cyclical harvesting of firewood from its trees. Such harvests ensured constant rejuvenation of the trees, extending their lives. So now I shelter beneath one of Europe’s oldest living organisms, in a landscape encompassing thousands more.
Follow Country diary on Twitter: @gdncountrydiary
