Oak Notes

 

What should I say about the English Oak (Quercus robur), what stories should I tell, there are so many. A sense of solidity, a constant presence in an English landscape which gives the majority of us a lazy sense that the oak will always be there, a pleasant green backdrop for our wellbeing walks. For example, a stay in a luxury Forest Holidays cabin promises “a natural sanctuary in one of Britain’s most famous oak forests”, with hot tub as standard. Here is the oak as a neatly packaged visitor experience. But cases such the Whitewebbs Park Oak, one of the oldest oaks in London, which was felled in April this year by contractors working for Toby Carvery, suggest that this apparent solidity should not be taken for granted. The tree was listed on the Woodland Trust inventory of ancient trees, but did not have the added legal protection of a tree preservation order.

How do we write and make art in the Anthropocene? It sometimes feels like being a very small voice in the midst of so much noise, how can it ever cut through? I try to think of it as joining a chorus, providing some of the harmonies. Whilst at primary school, my children told me they were learning persuasive writing, with a bullet-pointed list of exactly how to do it, because according to the national curriculum there is a correct way to write. With my scatter of words and facts that I struggle to weave together I worry that I’m straying off the path. Maybe I’ve been led astray by fairy folk who are said to reside in ancient oaks, or maybe the old stories are what I need.

I could tell you of the many species that live in oak, including the glorious purple hairstreak butterfly which feeds on oak flowers in midsummer, the males with their upper wings completely purple, the females with more subtle violet scribble crayoned across dark brown wings. Maybe a flash of colour will pull you in. Or what about the oakmoss lichen, grey/green feathery wisps furring the branches of ancient oaks. Highly sensitive to pollution, its return signals the relative success of twentieth century Clean Air Acts. In fact, the English Oak can support over 2,300 different species, and that’s not even counting bacteria and other microorganisms, no other tree in the UK supports such an amazing diversity of life. I’m sure the persuasive writing guidelines would approve of the many statistics I could serve up here, such as the 716 other types of lichen found on oaks, including 12 that depend on oak alone, or the 3 types of native woodpeckers who nest in oak.

Perhaps bringing some larger organisms into the story will help. Many birds and animals feed on the fruit of the oak, which I will always silently name as ‘haycorns’, having been imprinted in childhood by AA Milne’s Piglet. Acorns are a main attraction for 31 different mammals including badger, deer, wild boar, squirrel and woodmouse. From the corvid family, the flashily suited Jay is particularly partial, and often buries them for future sustenance; when forgotten, these caches sometimes germinate. Acorns apparently bring a particular flavour to bacon made from the pigs that rootle and feed on them. Depressingly, online retailer Temu will sell you clutches of plastic acorns in packs of 30 or 60 for craft projects. Or you could slip a real one into your pocket next time you pass an oak, it’s said to be good luck.

Oaks are often the tallest point in a country landscape, and so more likely to be struck by lightning in a storm. This may explain the many myths associating oaks with thunder gods including Zeus from Greek mythology and Thor from Norse. In a macabre twist, oak’s hardwood properties made it an ideal choice when constructing America’s first electric chair ‘Old Sparky’. Mechanised smiting of the unworthy. As we face a mass extinction event maybe we need more and better stories, maybe superstition has its place. Sticky things belief systems, they hold stuff together. Like the story of the two kings of the wood, the Oak and the Holly. Twice a year at winter and summer solstices it is said they would battle for the title of king of the woods. There are some lessons about balance there, if only we were able to hear it.

For Celtic peoples Oak was the most sacred tree, the centre of the world. The root was regarded as the door to the Otherworld, with “daur” the Celtic word for oak, thought to be the origin of our word ‘door’. A place of new beginnings. This ventricular word is also thought to be the origin of the word Druid, who worshipped in oak groves. The early Christian church had an uneasy relationship with the oak tree, as they were linked with these older pagan beliefs. The properties of the wood however made it an excellent building material, and many churches used oak beams and featured intricately carved oak panels. These often showed sacred and profane images side by side. Carved oak leaves and acorns were a popular decoration, often curling out of the mouth of the Green Man, a motif linked to the pagan tradition. Those old beliefs proved difficult to completely eradicate.

How much we have taken from the oak throughout the centuries, houses and furniture to fill them, ships that sailed to plunder, medieval pigs snuffling in woodland to gorge on acorns, the blackest ink from oak gall. These trees are time-travellers, the ultimate long term thinkers, some may live as long as 1,000 years. Like many other trees of ancient woodland they are under threat. In the UK our ancient forests are in scraps and tatters, making their survival even more precarious. We see a warming climate story written in tree rings; when an oak is felled we see well spaced rings which represent years of sufficient water and nutrition, whereas tighter closer rings show drought and stress. The changing climate also means more powdery mildew, a white dusting on the leaves of the oak, which affects the growth of the tree, makes it more susceptible to other infections and can lead to the death of the tree.

I take comfort from an oak tree precisely because it is so oblivious to me and my human preoccupations. I thrill to the thought of that interconnected web of life, a razzle dazzle of biodiversity above my head and under my feet, but to the tree my life is insignificant, unless I have a chainsaw in my hands of course. Maybe I need to return to the basics, and my eye falls on a sprouting acorn in a pot on my kitchen windowsill. It was given to me by a friend and a fellow forest school practitioner and comes from a tree in the garden of the outdoor nursery in Bristol where she works. I have sat beneath it on a summer’s day and been grateful for the shade. The shoot has tiny lobed leaves already, that familiar oak leaf in miniature, so recognisable. I look to it for hope, and listen carefully for the stories it might tell.

I wrote this piece after a prompt on a short nature writing course with University of Bristol. The challenge was to pick a subject we were interested in, research it and get writing. Lots of fascinating things to discover about the oak, and I'd particularly like to come back to folk beliefs surrounding this mighty tree. The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion by James George Frazer is fascinating to refer to on this subject, although the third and final edition published between 1906-1915 runs to twelve volumes, as I discovered when I requested it at Bristol Central Library. Luckily the index is comprehensive. The Woodland Trust also has lots of great oak facts, and links to recent scientific research about oaks and biodiversity.