Trees

The life of a Tree Warden is very hard.

The sun shone,  the birds sang,  the barley waved and the peas and beans rustled.   The jogger called a cheery “Good Morning!” and the runner nodded a breathless greeting.   The young lady dog-walker kept her eyes averted,  wanting to be solitary:  the couple spoke and waved from 20 metres,  petting the dog,  making a small fuss.   The milk cows grazed and gazed.   A fishing heron protested raucously and flapped ungainly into the air.   They have a way of flying away in a big circle and,  when the dangerous creature has gone,  settling again in almost the same place.   The pair of swans in the lode was too busy puddling duckweed through its pair of bills to notice.   But the mallard fled,  for worlds looking like an X-wing fighter,  straight out of Star Wars.

The fen goes endlessly to the flat horizon,  with its wind turbines and pylons,  growing quietly to itself.

Ah,  the trees.

A Lime,  in flower,  waiting to drip its sickly sweet smelling sap onto any polished car that might venture that far into the fen.

A Crab-apple,  its fruit swelling from the rain and the sun,  but not yet coloured.

A few small Oaks,  planted along the headland next to the drove;  and a magnificent old tree in the middle of a barley field at the head of a ditch.

A grove of Blackthorn,  grown into trees,  not hedgerows,  with the sloes swelling.   Jocelyn will want to know about these for her sloe gin later in the year.

Some of the hedgerows are wild,  neglected,  growing toward becoming trees.   Others,  along the paved drove,  have been meticulously trimmed.   Some people rail against the flail which the farmer uses to trim the hedges but,  used carefully,  and at the right time of year,  they do a good job.   By now,  early August,  the flailed hedges look very smart.