Risedale Rangers

Wednesday, September 26th 2018

We're still tidying up from recent storms and high winds here at Foxglove; thankfully I was able to call on the kids from Risedale Sports & Community College to help me.

We started the day by taking a walk to see the Owl and Bat Box that the college have adopted as part of our Adopt-A-Box Scheme and quickly moved on to gathering fallen debris into habitat piles and piles ready for burning.

Some of the branches were quite formidable, such as this Ash limb that the group were working on just before lunch.

Foxglove has many veteran Ash trees that are monitored regularly for signs of Ash Dieback caused by the fungi Hymenoscyphus fraxineus. The fungus causes leaf loss, crown dieback and bark lesions in affected trees and once infected is usually fatal, either directly, or indirectly by weakening the tree to the point where it succumbs more readily to attacks by other pests or pathogens.

Thankfully some ash trees seem able to tolerate or resist infection, and scientists are studying the genetic factors which make this possible so that tolerant ash trees can be bred for the future.

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