I was much cheered today to read that privet is related to ash and may be threatened with extinction or near-extinction by the blight that threatens ash trees. No longer will my nose be assailed by the sickening stench of wet, warm privet leaves! I can hardly believe my luck.
A lot of people claim to like the stench but they are so obviously perverse that I don't care about them. It will do them good to be deprived of their dark and sinister pleasures. Let's hear it for ash die-back disease!
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Ash Die-back is very sad ;-( another Native English Species being wiped out by a foreign invader! - Its our funeral - Ashes to Ashes!
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Yes but ash was always a bit of a weed tree.
I'd like to see a leylandii disease introduced!
Edit: Snap L'es
Last edited by: Fenlander on Mon 12 Nov 12 at 14:43
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British Leylandii Disease?
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>> British Leylandii Disease?
>>
That means moving this thread to Motoring doesn't it!!
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>> I was much cheered today to read that privet is related to ash and may
>> be threatened with extinction or near-extinction by the blight that threatens ash trees.
I'd much rather have a privet hedge than a Cupressus x leylandii which a lot of estate-dwellers seem to favour.
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>> I'd much rather have a privet hedge than a Cupressus x leylandii which a lot
>> of estate-dwellers seem to favour.
Might be the estate-builders rather than the -dwellers who favour them - that was the case at our previous house.
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I was pleased to see that there will not be a problem with Morgan production if the Ash die back gets really serious!
tinyurl.com/bevfmks
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I wish the ash at the front of our neighbour's garden had died back before this years crop of leaves had formed. It would have saved us having to sweep up all the leaves which have just dropped off and been blown in our direction!
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In 20 years time it will all be forgotten. A new generation of disease-resistant ash seedlings will have matured.
Next on the list:
Rhododendron die-back
Ivy wilt
Golden Delicious canker
Japanese Knotweed blight
Himalyan Balsam rot
EU pull-out.
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"In 20 years time it will all be forgotten. A new generation of disease-resistant ash seedlings will have matured."
Ash trees reach maturity at around 100 years and can live to over 200 years. If they all die you won't ever see a mature ash tree in England again which is sad.
In some parts of the country like the Peak district they are the dominant tree in the landscape. The countryside will not look the same for a long long time.
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>> If they all die you won't ever see a mature ash tree in England again which is sad.
It seems there's a resistant strain of ash trees so with luck they won't all die and could make a comeback.
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"It seems there's a resistant strain of ash trees so with luck they won't all die and could make a comeback."
Let's hope so.
Not sure about your hatred for privet - why is it wet and warm? Are you smoking it?
For a really smelly shrub try Choisya "Sundance' Essence of cat's pee when cut. Ribes is pretty bad too.
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>> Not sure about your hatred for privet - why is it wet and warm?
It smells stronger, therefore worse, in summer when it has been raining. A lot worse than cat pee in my book.
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Privet is boring admittedly, but is an excellent privacy screen, and grows even when pruned back hard. Can't say I've ever noticed the smell of it.
Leylandii are always planted or inherited by people who never maintain them, so they just become monstrosities that kill everything around them. Burn them all.
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>>Leylandii are always planted or inherited by people who never maintain them, so they just become monstrosities that kill everything around them. Burn them all<<
In the correct placement, and left to do their thing (like ere) they make a mighty fine conifer.
They also make a good windbrake, and so are ideal for vegetarians.
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>> It seems there's a resistant strain of ash trees so with luck they won't all
>> die and could make a comeback.
Prince Charles has some:
www.thisisgloucestershire.co.uk/Prince-s-ash-trees-help-fight-fungus/story-17299539-detail/story.html
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30 000 000 ash trees , why dont they build a wood burning power station and use the dead wood up?
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>> Ash trees reach maturity at around 100 years and can live to over 200 years.
>> If they all die you won't ever see a mature ash tree in England again
>> which is sad.
>>
May be, but they are pretty big after 20 years.
I planted a wood from scratch 10 years ago, 85% ash. The trees are now about 30 feet high and 6-9 inches diameter.
Those growing along the road are 25 years old and are now about 18 inches in diameter.
It will all grow back again. Remember the Great Hurricane of 1988? It was supposed to have been a disaster that would change the face of British woodlands. It's hard to spot the damage now.
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"It will all grow back again."
Seen an elm tree lately?
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>> It will all grow back again. Remember the Great Hurricane of 1988? It was supposed
>> to have been a disaster that would change the face of British woodlands. It's hard
>> to spot the damage now.
Try looking anywhere along the North or South downs, its not difficult.
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If a large number of ash trees die, I understand that they will be replaced by sycamores. Round here, sycamores grow like weeds and seed themselves everywhere. Ugh!
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Thats to be commended! usually the "replacement" is a cheapo fast -growing Pine-like thing! - That Toilet Tissue firm that claims to re-plant 3 for every one used, will probably use future usable needle-leafed varieties, so they are not being "Green" as Such (as they are wanting you to think), they are expanding their raw materials base. Now if they were made to plant Two or even one broad-leaf variety per three, that would certainly help!
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>> Thats to be commended!
That's not what this lot think. tinyurl.com/cd7xqzy
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There is no upside to ash die-back. One of the downsides will be a less visually appealing Autumn. Cant abide evergreen trees in the UK.
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>> There is no upside to ash die-back.
No, there isn't really. The thread title is a sour joke. And regular, dense evergreen plantations (a la Forestry Commission in parts of East Anglia) are indeed gloomy and boring. However there are evergreens effectively native to Britain and there are also foreign strains (Corsican pine, cypress etc.) that look good in the right landscape.
I still can't abide the pong of privet though.
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>>usually the "replacement" is a cheapo fast -growing Pine-like thing!
Time to time I work up in the Amazon at a Pulp & Paper plant. Lots of people with typically great sounding tree replacement strategies up there. If only the Rain Forest had ever been eucalyptus then it'd be perfect.
There are terrible places in the Amazon Forest which are like some kind of moonscape with not a growth to be seen for miles. Its can make you weep.
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The upside of ash die-back - devonite
