When is a tree not a tree? When it's covered with Ivy...

Once upon a time there was a tree.

It lived and grew, in a pleasant back garden, and no-one minded that it was only eight or nine feet away from what we all still call a "telegraph pole". even though we no longer have telegraphs.  The Utility Pole - that's the correct name for them, now - in question supports the power lines to the house. So it's quite important.

Being out of sight behind the shed, Ivy also grew in that area.

"Hey, that's a nice tree," said the Ivy (not out loud, obviously), "I think I'll climb up there and see if I can take over the neighbourhood."

So the Ivy climbed the tree.

The houseowners, not realising what a problem this would become, let it grow. 

From time to time, they made half-hearted attempts to pull down the Ivy, but they never did more than superficial damage, and over a period of time, the Ivy made it right up to the top of the tree.

"Heh, heh," smirked the Ivy (again, not out loud, obviously), "I've made it to the top! Excellent, now I shall spread my limbs out in all directions, in case there is anything else nearby which I can climb."

The Ivy was also smothering the tree, but didn't particularly care, because a) Ivy has no concept of time, or the future consequences of its actions:  and b) it is the spawn of the devil, and doesn't care about any other plants, anyway.

Eventually the householders realised that the tree was getting perilously close to their power lines, and if the tree were to damage those power lines, it might affect their enjoyment of the many electrical gadgets with which they had filled their home.

So they called in the trusty Garden Team, that's me and my Arborist, and asked us to take the ivy off the upper parts of the tree, and to trim back the branches which were nearly touching the power lines.

After informing the electricity company, and gaining permission to work (this is all legal stuff, don't worry about it), we set to work on the tree, and found out that in fact there was barely any tree left, under all the ivy, and that in fact the many "branches" which were threatening the power lines were - in fact! - ivy branches.

Yes, ivy can achieve significant thickness of stem - remember the Gigantic Ivy which I shared with you, earlier this year?

Ivy stems can lean out, mid-air and unsupported, for easily six to eight feet, and that's what had happened at the top of this tree.

So it was actually the ivy threatening to eat the power lines, not the tree!

Either way, it had to go, so we cut off the ivy, and contemplated what was left of the tree (which is a story for another day).

As the tree was in a fairly sorry state, we reduced it in height, and here is one of the "slices" off the top of the tree:

You can just see the tip of my boot, at the bottom of the photo, for scale.

Gosh, just look at all those closely-packed stems.

Hang on a minute: those are not all tree stems, are they?

Some of the are ..... IVY!!

Closer inspection revealed that only three of these cut stems are actual tree material:

 

Just those three with the arrows pointing to them.

All the rest were ivy stems.

How incredible is that?!

Almost the entire top of the tree was ivy!

So, folks, don't ever let ivy sneak up your garden trees: you may think it is harmless, but it's an evil plant which is planning to EAT your trees, smother them, and eventually kill them!

 

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