Elm flowers

We lived in Warwickshire for a few years in the early 1970s and one of my abiding memories of the landscape there was of magnificent elm trees which, in spring, were covered in a haze of carmine red flowers. Dutch elm disease felled almost all the mature elms but hedgerow shrubby elm trees are still common throughout the country, sprouting from the roots of the old trees. 

We found these elms flowering along the river Wear near Wolsingham in Co. Durham yesterday, where there are a few that are reaching tree proportions and have grown to  about 12 metres tall. It will be interesting to see how well these specimens survive and whether they attract the attention of the bark beetle that carries the Dutch elm disease fungus.

Elm is still a common species, albeit in shrub rather than tree form, because it regenerates new shoots from its roots, even though it produces no viable seeds. It will be interesting to see whether ash trees regenerate shrubby growth in the same way once ash dieback disease takes hold..............

Elm flowers

Back in the early 1970s we lived in the Midlands for a few years and I can still remember the rows of stately elms whose crowns took on a crimson hue at this time of year as the flower buds on their twigs burst. Those magnificent trees are long gone, thanks to the Dutch elm disease fungus and the bark beetle that spread it from tree to tree, but shrubby hedgerow elm is still common enough. These twigs were just coming into flower in Teesdale earlier this week. Nearby there are also a few largish elms, although I guess the bark beetle will sooner or later find them too.

There are still some mature elms in the UK that have either escaped the fungus or are perhaps immune. The Natural History Museum has been surveying their distribution. You can download a leaflet about their Elm Map Project here.

For more posts on tree ID click here