Month: Sep 2019

“You are an aperture through which the universe is looking at and exploring itself.”
~ Alan Watts

Carved Tree Stump ~ Photo by Claude Rozay.

The Queen Sirikit Botanical Garden is located 30 minutes north of Chiang Mai, along the windy road to Samoeng.

The Queen Sirikit Botanical Garden (QSBG) in Mae Rim District, Chiang Mai Province, Thailand was opened in 1993 and is maintained under the auspices of the Botanical Garden Organization (BGO) of the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment. Originally named the Mae Sa Botanic Garden, it was renamed for Sirikit, Queen of Thailand in 1994.

The 6,500 rai site is home to 12 greenhouses, Thailand’s biggest glasshouse complex. It displays plants and flowers year round. It was the first botanical garden of international standard in Thailand and focuses on maintaining biodiversity and promoting environmental conservation.

The Garden is set in a valley surrounded by rainforest and there is a whole range of different areas to visit. Visitors can walk around the flower gardens, banana path or enter one of the many different greenhouses – Savanna House, Orchid House or the Carnivorous Plant House. Another highlight of the gardens is a 400 metre canopy walkway which is suspended over the jungle canopy and gives an enlightening perspective of nature from high up in the air.

There is the option to take your motorbike (30 Baht) or car (50 Baht) into Queen Sirikit Botanical Garden if you don’t feel like walking around the area. The entire gardens are huge and you will need transportation if you want to see it all in one day. Don’t worry of you don’t have your own car or motorbike because they have a shuttle bus to use which has stops at each section.

Entrance to the Botanical Garden costs 50 Baht per person and you get a free map to help you get around. Outside the Botanical Garden is a coffee shop, gift shop and parking area if you prefer to walk rather than drive around the gardens. You should plan at least 3 hours to visit Queen Sirikit Botanical Gardens but you could spend the whole day here there is so much to see.

Queen Sirikit Botanical Gardens Opening Hours: 8:30 – 16:30 Location: 100 moo 9, mae ram Mae Rim District, Chiang Mai 50180 Tel: +66 (0)53 841 000

Reference http://www.chiangmai.bangkok.com/attractions/queen-sirikit-botanical-gardens.htm?cid=ch:OTH:001

Trees function as the lungs of our planet but they also serve as footholds. Their roots stabilise and aerate the soil, allowing water to be absorbed. Trees are a powerful antidote to the impact of over grazing which exposes the soil to erosion by wind and the rain and also compacts the soil, diminishing its capacity to hold water.

The Great Green Wall is an African-led movement with an epic ambition to grow an 8,000km natural wonder of the world across the entire width of Africa.

A decade in and by 2016 and roughly 15% underway, the initiative is already bringing life back to Africa’s degraded landscapes at an unprecedented scale, providing food security, jobs and a reason to stay for the millions who live along its path.

The Wall promises to be a compelling solution to the many urgent threats not only facing the African Continent, but the global community as a whole – notably climate change, drought, famine, conflict and migration.

Once complete, the Great Green Wall will be the largest living structure on the planet, 3 times the size of the Great Barrier Reef.

The 16 kilometer-wide wall of trees, bushes and shrubs crosses Africa’s Sahel region at the southern edge of the Sahara Desert and passing through 21 countries, starting on the west coast in Senegal and ending on the east coast in Djibouti started in 2007. The USD 8 billion project is expected to create 350,000 jobs in one of the poorest regions of the world.
In Senegal, around 11 million drought-resistant trees such as acacias have already been planted. The millions of plants will make the ground more fertile, allowing about 100 million hectares of once lifeless desert to become agricultural land by 2030. In Ethiopia, 15 million hectares of agricultural land have already been reclaimed from the previously rapidly expanding Sahara.

History

During an expedition to the Sahara in 1954 Richard St. Barbe Baker proposed a ‘Green Front’ to act as a 30 mile deep tree buffer to contain the expanding desert. The idea re-emerged in 2002 at the special summit in N’Djamena, Chad on the occasion of World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought. It was approved by the Conference of Leaders and Heads of States members of the Community of Sahel Saharan States during their seventh ordinary session held in Ouagadougou in June, 2005. The African Union endorsed it in 2007 as the ‘Great Green Wall for the Sahara and the Sahel {GGWSSI.

The GGWSSI has modified and expanded the scope of the project to include boosting food security, and supporting local communities to adapt to climate change. The Wall project now consists of a mosaic of projects implemented by over 20 countries in the region with the support of about 24 development partners.

Contrary to popular perception, desertification is not caused by sand-dune movement. It occurs during periods of drought, where activities like overgrazing can lead to extreme erosion of topsoil. This is exactly what has happened in the district of Mopti in Mali where recurrent drought, unsustainable land practices, and deforestation have severely degraded the land, leading to poverty and food crises.

Working with our partner, Sahel Eco, and local communities, ITF has now regenerated 16,972 trees in this area. The trees chosen are drought resistant species that fertilize the soil as well as providing fruits, fodder and fuel wood for local communities.

The results speak for themselves. In Ethiopia, 15 million hectares of degraded land restored, in Nigeria, 5 million hectares restored, and in Sudan, 2 000 hectares restored. As of the end of 2015, Senegal has planted over 12 million trees over 40,000 hectares of land. And as of March 2016, the tree population in Burkina Faso has increased by over 3 million.

There is a philosophy that says first there were trees, then there was man and then there was the desert.

Reference https://www.greatgreenwall.org/about-great-green-wall.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Green_Wall

https://internationaltreefoundation.org/the-great-green-wall-for-the-sahara-and-the-sahel/

Equinox Blessings 🍃🌲🌿🍂🌳🍁 Summer is at a close and it is a time to reap what we have sown. As the sun sets earlier and the wind and rain blow the leaves from the trees, we are reminded it is time to let go. We are the gateway to a new season and as we gather the harvest we give thanks that it will sustain us through the darkness of winter.

“The wheel of the year is turning once more. Here in the Northern Hemisphere we being our journey into Autumn on this this Autumnal Equinox. To me, this is a time for reflection, for giving thanks for all the growth and beauty in my garden in the Summer months and remembering that there can be beauty in every season. Of course, for our friends in the Southern Hemisphere their Spring is just beginning. Nature continues her journey”. 🌳🍃🍂 The Guardian of the Woods.

Danish Artist Thomas Dambo has built seven giant trolls from reclaimed wood in the de schore of boom, belgium. Using old shelves, pallets and branches from fallen trees Dambo has created 13 to 60 foot tall sculptures,which are dotted around the forest with some practicing chores or taking a rest.

The installation makes the 15th anniversary of the electronic festival known as tomorrowland as a gift to the local community, over 200 volunteers helped to collect the materials needed before Dambo and a crew of 15 people spent 25 weeks building the sculptures.

To accompany the sculptures Dambo has written a rap that tells an enchanting fairytale of seven giant trolls from the forest they watch the little people their concerns growing for what the future may hold if they were left to their own devices. The trolls decide to build a tower inviting the little people into the forest to climb it so they can see the vast beauty of nature.

Dambo is known for his mythical troll sculptures having installed them in several locations across the world including puerto rico, south korea, across the US and Denmark.

Reference: https://www.designboom.com/art/thomas-dambo-seven-trolls-outdoor-sculptures-08-28-2019/

Þórsmörk has a Birch Forest

The first settlers of Iceland brought sheep, pigs and horses with them. Back in the days, Iceland was covered with trees, which had to be cut down to create pastures for the livestock. Over hundreds of years, more and more forests were turned into grasslands for cattle, until almost all the trees were cut. This phenomenon is called forest clearance for agriculture. For a long time, reforestation efforts were difficult, especially because the livestock ate the seedlings of Icelandic birch trees.

These days, reforestation is going well, and Þórsmörk is one of the places that has a flourishing birch forest. It has been kept by the Icelandic Forest Service since 1920.

Hallormsstaðaskógur
In East Iceland, you can find a forest of 7.4km2 called Hallormsstaðaskógur. It has been preserved since 1905 and it’s Iceland’s first national forest. The area has great hiking trails of a total of 40km, for instance to Ljósárfoss waterfall, the Hallormsstaður cliffs, and Geirólfsstaðir farm. It contains 85 different tree species, and it offers great opportunities for berry and mushroom picking. Thirsty after a hike? Clear streams with drinkable water run through the area. In the forest, there are two campsites and several picnic spots.

Ásbyrgi Nature Reserve
Ásbyrgi is a glacial, horseshoe-shaped canyon about 30km from Dettifoss. As legend goes, Sleipnir, Oðinn’s eight-legged horse, created the canyon by stepping onto land there. The cliffs of the canyon are 100m tall, and within the cliffs the area is covered with lush birch trees, green grass, herbs, and flowers. The high cliffs shelter the area from wind, making it easier for nature to flourish. There are lots of hiking options in the area, from short hikes to day hikes, and you can also visit information centre Gljúfrastofa.

Reference: https://www.whatson.is/icelandic-forests/

By all these lovely tokens
September days are here,
With summer’s best of weather
And autumn’s best of cheer.
~ Helen Hunt Jackson

“Shining red hawthorn berries.
Today is a day to pick them to add to my three stages tincture which already has the medicine of the leaves and blossom in.
This is a medicine for the heart and for connection to this wonderful and deeply magical tree.
Hawthorn also contains a large amount of pectin which makes it so good for fruit leathers, jams and to thicken sauces.
I adore to nibble these berries or haws as they are also known. They taste of avocado and apples”.

Words by Brigit Anna McNeill

About The Author

Robin Harford is a professional forager, ethnobotanical researcher, wild food educator and sensory botanist. He gathers wild edible plants on a daily basis, and is the creator of the UK’s leading wild food site eatweeds.co.uk, which is listed in The Times Top 50 websites for food and drink. Robin has been writing, filming, publishing and teaching people about their local edible landscape since 2008. Recently his foraging courses where voted #1 in the country by BBC Countryfile. He is also a co-director of Plants & Healers International, a nonprofit that connects people, plants and healers around the world. He travels extensively documenting and recording the traditional and local uses of wild food plants in indigenous cultures, and his work has taken him to Africa, India, SE Asia, Europe and the USA. Robin has taught foraging at Eden Project, appeared on BBC2’s Edwardian Farm, Soul Seekers TV series, appeared on national and local BBC radio and been recommended in BBC Good Food magazine, Sainsbury’s magazine as well as in The Guardian, The Times, The Independent, The Daily Telegraph, GQ, The Ecologist and Green Parent, to name a few.

Oak Notebook

In America the American Chestnut has been called the Redwood of the East. It’s trunk soared 100 feet high and could reach 10 feet in diameter. With crowns that spanned a fifth of an acre, its prodigious nut crops were essential food for everything from bears to pigeons. It was known as the cradle to the grave tree because people were born in rot resistant Chestnut houses, warmed by Chestnut fires, entertained by Chestnut fiddles and laid to rest in Chestnut coffins.Then in 1876, a nurseryman imported some Japanese Chestnut seeds that carried a fungus in which the American Chestnut had no resistance. The blight was discovered in 1904 at the Bronx zoo and it spread with shocking speed. By 1950, four billion American Chestnuts- 99.9% of the species had died, their bark ripped open to reveal a sickly orange rot girdling their trunks.In the New York Botanical Gardens there are three genetically modified Chestnut trees with a sign at the base of the trees ~ American Chestnut Trial, Castanea Dentata, Darling 4. Born in a lab in Syracuse, Darling 4 was engineered by geneticist who inserted a wheat gene into a wild Chestnut embryo extracted from an immature nut. The gene gives the Chestnut the ability to make an enzyme that detoxifies the blight – a skill none of the four billion American Chestnuts preceded it ever developed.Darling 4 doesn’t make enough of the enzyme to stop the blight completely, but its successor, Darling 58 – currently flourishing on a research farm at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse – does. The goal is for the new tree to be distributed to nurseries and planted in forests throughout the East marking a major milestone in the story of GMOs.

Before it can be released into the wild the transgenic Chestnut has to pass a battery of ecological tests at SUNY designed to ensure that it acts like a natural Chestnut. Then it must be approved by the United States Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency. So far the tree has excelled in all the tests. Approval is looking likely.

Research on genetically engineered trees has been with species commonly used in industrial plantations – poplar, pine and eucalyptus – and has focused on engineering traits that would boost profitability, such as disease resistance, insect resistance, herbicide tolerance, cold tolerance and faster growth. In this they have mirrored the development of GMO crops, and they have drawn similar criticisms.

Resistance to genetically engineered trees has been strong with the ‘Campaign to Stop GE Trees’ leading the charge. To date only a handful of transgenic have made it to field trials, including frost tolerant eucalyptus trees and fast growing poplar and eucalyptus and only two have had significant commercial rollout: an insect resistant poplar in China and transgenic papayas in Hawaii and China. ArborGen, the company that invented the cold tolerant eucalyptus, petitioned the USDA for clearance to farm the tree in the US back in 2011, but it is still waiting a ruling.

The genetically engineered Chestnut is different as no one is seeking to profit from it. Its only purpose is to save a beloved species from extinction.

Darling 58 is now being crossed with the surviving wild Chestnuts via hand pollination, to produce a line of hundreds of unique trees that will embody the full breadth of America Chestnut biodiversity. These trees will have the full suite of 38,000 native Chestnut genes. Later this year SUNY will submit its application to release the Chestnut to the EPA, the FDA and the USDA. If the agencies all approve, seedlings could be ready for distribution by 2021.

The scientists at SUNY have tested as many aspects of its interactions with its future environment as possible. They’ve checked to make sure mycorrhizal fungi colonise its roots normally. They’ve confirmed that grasses, shrubs, pine trees and maple trees will germinate in its leaf litter. They’ve fed its leaf detritus to insects and tadpoles and they’ve let bees feast on its pollen.

In all the tests, there have been no difference between the transgenic Chestnut and the wild Chestnut.

Yet even though the Chestnut is being developed for the public good, the ‘Campaign to Stop GE Trees’ has raised concerns that it will open the door to commercial entities with less benevolent plans.

Ash trees are now dying. They’ve been attacked by the emerald Ash borer, an Asian beetle that arrived in Michigan 20 years ago in a packing shipment killing 99.7% of Ashes in its path, hundreds of millions of trees.

The Ashes are just the latest victims. The needles of nearly every hemlock are clumped with white waxy balls produced by the woolly adelgid as it sucks their sap. Most Eastern hemlocks from Canada to the Smoky Mountains will soon be grey ghosts. The American Elms are already gone having succumbed to Dutch Elm disease long ago. The grey bark of Beech trees are cankered with Beech bark disease.

All these declines are due to introduced species or insects or fungi to which our native trees have little resistance. The impact on our forests is massive.

So perhaps if the Darling 58 Chestnuts get their approval, they will grow tall, spread their crowns and when autumn comes drop their bounteous crop of nuts. The wildlife feeding on them won’t give a thought to the unusual coil of DNA keeping these trees alive. They’ll just eat and settle into autumn and life will go on.

Reference: https://psmag.com/ideas/most-controversial-tree-in-the-world-gmo-genetic-engineering

Images by Jason Holley.