Richmond - Kew Gardens (Surrey)

Giant Redwood near the Treetop walk	Coast Redwood near the Treetop walk

Among the young trees that have been planted near the Treetop Walkway in Kew Gardens are a Giant and a Coast Redwood. The Giant Redwood stands near the base of the stairs and lift, growing beside a large fallen tree trunk, and is almost 4 metres high. The Coast Redwood is nearly 2.5 metres high and is leaning rather badly in January 2010, hopefully this will be straightened before it gets much taller. A nearby plaque states: "This is a coastal redwood (Sequoia sempervirens), the tallest living things on Earth. The biggest stretch 115m into the sky - can you imagine climbing six and a half times higher than Kew's Xstrata Treetop Walkway?"

Coast Redwood

Coast Redwood

Throughout the grounds at Kew there are solitary Redwood trees and some in pairs or groups of three.

A young Giant Redwood planted in the middle of the Redwood Grove

Ornamental Pheasants roaming among the Redwood trees

In the Redwood grove there is a mixture of all three types of Redwoods of differing ages. The largest Giant Redwood measured in the grove, and in the whole of the gardens, had a girth of 4.83m and its height was 34.8m in January 2010.

Dawn Redwood (Mexican Cyprus across the lake)	Dawn Redwood by the lake

Around the lake there are several Dawn Redwood (Metasequoia glyptosroboides), including some young ones that appear to be recently planted, and also a Mexican Cyprus (Taxodium mucronatum) is growing by the bridge. It was holding onto its golden orange foliage to give a stunning display in the winter sun in January.

A Swamp Cyprus and a Wollemi Pine on an island in the lake

There are four or five Wollemi Pine (Wollemia nobilis) on the island in the middle of the lake and you can see one on the righthand side of the above photograph. Another couple stand near the Orangery Restaurant, one is in a veritable fortress of a steel cage. This ancient surviving tree has the appearance of what might be the result if you could cross a Redwood with a Monkey Puzzle (Araucaria araucana) tree! The "knees" of the Swamp Cyprus (Taxodium distichum) can be seen either side at the base of the larger tree in the above photograph. These are part of the root system that grow upwards to enable the roots to breathe in very swampy conditions. Although the Swamp Cyprus is a deciduous pine that is very similar to the Dawn Redwood, this is one of the ways of telling them apart because the Dawn Redwood does not produce "knees".

Dawn Redwood: opposing needles

The needles are another way to tell the difference. The picture on the right shows that the needles of a Swamp Cyprus are alternate along the stem. By comparison, the picture on the left is that of Dawn Redwood foliage where the needles are on opposite sides along the stem. (The colour of the foliage will vary depending on the time of year).

Swamp Cyprus: alternate needles

A Peacock by the lake

An Ornamental Pheasant	Dawn Redwood as twilight approaches

Kew Gardens has been a place that was on the list to visit for quite some time, and it certainly did not disappoint. As might be expected, there are some great walks through a garden that offers an enormous variety of plants both outside and inside its great glasshouses. Peacocks and Ornamental Pheasants are among the many birds that frequent the gardens and Kew boasts that it has the largest compost heap in the world! Allow plenty of time to explore the gardens, a whole day is still not enough. There is the Kew Explorer bus if you prefer a drive around the perimeter and there are several stops where you may alight. The bus passes through the Redwood Grove and the guide could be heard to describe the Redwoods as "lovely trees." (No surprise there!)

The Temperate House

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Giant Redwoods - September 2023

Above are a few of Peter's photographs from his visit to Kew Gardens in September 2023. It's great to see the young Giant Redwoods doing so well.

Common Names and Latin Name	No.	Latitude and Longitude		OS National Grid	Elevation (above sea-level)	Height	Girth	Date Measured
		WGS84	OSGB36
Giant Redwood Sequoiadendron giganteum	1	N51.47541 W0.29789	N51.47490 W0.29633	TQ 18306 76534	34ft (10.37m)	3.9m	0.17m	Jan 2010
Coast Redwood Sequoia sempervirens	2	N51.47585 W0.29761	N51.47534 W0.29605	TQ 18325 76584	67ft (20.43m)	2.45m	--	Jan 2010
	3	N51.47622 W0.29832	N51.47571 W0.29676	TQ 18274 76624	16ft (04.88m)	28.2m	3.22m	Jan 2010
	4	N51.47617 W0.29818	N51.47566 W0.29662	TQ 18284 76618	17ft (05.18m)	28m	3.29m	Jan 2010
	5	N51.47337 W0.29835	N51.47286 W0.29679	TQ 18280 76307	21ft (06.40m)	25.6m	3.07m	Jan 2010
Giant Redwood Sequoiadenron giganteum	6	N51.47355 W0.30075	N51.47304 W0.29919	TQ 18112 76323	26ft (07.93m)	--	--	--
Giant Redwood Sequoiadendron giganteum	7	N51.47362 W0.30088	N51.47311 W0.29932	TQ 18103 76330	47ft (14.33m)	34.8m	4.83m	Jan 2010
Coast Redwood Sequoia sempervirens	8	N51.47374 W0.29695	N51.47323 W0.29539	TQ 18376 76350	34ft (10.37m)	22.2m	2.88m	Jan 2010
Giant Redwood Sequoiadendron giganteum	9	N51.47652 W0.29981	N51.47601 W0.29825	TQ 18170 76655	29ft (08.84m)	34.1m	4.5m	Jan 2010
	10	N51.47608 W0.30027	N51.47557 W0.29871	TQ 18139 76605	19ft (05.79m)	26.7m	3.45m	Jan 2010
	11	N51.47601 W0.30036	N51.47550 W0.2988	TQ 18133 76597	19ft (05.79m)	23.3m	2.76m	Jan 2010
	12	N51.47603 W0.30043	N51.47552 W0.29887	TQ 18128 76599	11ft (03.35m)	20.9m	2.87m	Jan 2010
Dawn Redwood Metasequoia glyptostrobodies	13	N51.47604 W0.30139	N51.47553 W0.29983	TQ 18062 76599	12ft (03.66m)	18.8m	3.05m	Jan 2010
	14	N51.47623 W0.30261	N51.47572 W0.30105	TQ 17976 76618	19ft (05.79m)	2.62m	--	Jan 2010
	15	N51.47625 W0.30267	N51.47574 W0.30111	TQ 17972 76620	12ft (03.66m)	17.3m	2.01m	Jan 2010
	16	N51.47627 W0.30258	N51.47576 W0.30102	TQ 17978 76622	3ft (00.91m)	2.02m	--	Jan 2010
	17	N51.47670 W0.29956	N51.47619 W0.298	TQ 18187 76675	6ft (01.83m)	12.4m	2.1m	Jan 2010
	18	N51.48330 W0.29084	N51.48279 W0.28928	TQ 18776 77423	22ft (06.71m)	10.8m	--	Jan 2010
Girth was measured at 1.5m from ground.
This list does not include all of the Redwoods in the Redwood Grove.