Today was a ‘commute to the office’ day, which takes me past St James’ Park. There is a beautiful mature fig tree which in October was absolutely laden with figs and I took a photo of it this morning, sculptural and bare, save for a few figlets hanging on through the winter.
I took part in ‘tree following’ last year for the first time, focusing on my ‘Black Lady’ mulberry, a black mulberry designed for pot growing.
This year, I’m going to be following the three apple trees in my garden. One, very old and productive tree, variety unknown (although we suspect it is Beauty of Bath), and two planted just last winter: Norfolk Biffin, a cooking apple which has a fascinating history and which I will talk about more in another post, and Dawn, a dessert variety.
But I also decided to follow the fig tree in St James’ Park as it is just so captivating. I’ve always been transported to Greece anytime I catch the scent of a fig tree in the sunshine.
I’ll be starting the official tree following next month, and you can find more about it by the curator over at The Squirrelbasket. I am looking forward to learning more about wonderful trees, both in gardens and in the wild, in the UK and further afield.
Good to see that you’re doing tree following again this year. I look forward to your posts about the apples and a fig, both good choices.
I’ve yet to decide what tree I’m going to follow, but it may well be an elder. xx