Kelvedon - Hollow Road (Essex)

Giant Redwood - May 2020

Thanks to Ian who wrote to say "We recently bought a property in Kelvedon Essex and it has what we believe to be a large Sequoia in the garden. There is a (probably tall) tale about seeds being given to James I who then gave them out to houses around England and our house received one, but we don't believe that to be true. Regardless of that it would be great to know more about the tree. Are you still answering questions on the subject?" Your instinct is correct on this subject, these trees were not brought into Britain until the mid-1800s so the James I link is not possible. It would have been a great tale though! The Victorians were very fond of these trees and quite a few were planted at first (most frequently in stately homes and church grounds), but interest waned somewhat in intervening years. A minor revival in more recent years has seen a number of plantings by councils and some private estates, but they are still relatively rare. Nevertheless, I am still amazed at the amount of interest in them via my website, and the number of emails I receive to what I thought would be a very minor interest site when I started it almost twenty years ago. So, yes, I am still answering questions about them, albeit as an enthusiastic amateur rather than a professional arborist. "Thanks very much for taking the time to reply. We are not sure if this is small medium or large in size and we looked at various pictures on your website and it is quite "Xmas tree" looking so wondered if that is a Coastal Redwood? Our house was bought by Baron Western just before the turn of the 19thC and he imported all sorts of things like statues and marble from Rome, so it wouldn't surprise me if he imported this too at some point! In fact back then he probably owned the Feering land too." The photograph you sent shows a definite profile of a Sequoiadendron giganteum (Giant Redwood) rather than a Sequoia sempervirens (Coast Redwood). I keep meaning to put some profile shots of the differing types on the "Redwood Types" page. You might be able to compare foliage of your tree on that page. When very young (and by that I mean up to thirty or so years old), the Sequoiadendron giganteum will often have a very clean pyramidal outline, much like a traditional Christmas tree shape, but beyond that age the shape becomes more uneven. The top, when undisturbed, can still have that shape for the upper four or five metres but more frequently wind or lightning damage will disrupt the leader and the tree make take on the form as per your own example. Even with undisturbed examples, there will be generally a rounding of the uppermost foliage. Your tree looks a real beauty, sitting in a lovely position and not crowded by other trees.