Thank you Melanie, fascinating. Several points of connection here.
I spent my teen years in a house next to some open land on a chalk down near Portsmouth called Portsdown Hill. It had been cleared for sleep grazing, but these had not returned after WWII, so gorse was starting to grow. There were gorse fires every , likely started by careless smokers.
In 1969, the BBC ran a drama series called Take Three Girls. The theme tune was called Light Flight by Pentangle. I headed off to university that year and bought my first record player. The third album I bought was Basket of Light. I still have it. The next luxury I bought was an acoustic guitar. £10 in Woolworths. My parents are from Yorkshire and I had no idea that whin was gorse!
I sold my parents' house on the hill in 2018. By then, hawthorn bushes had grown up through the gorse which was largely gone.
Here in the PNW we introduced the related but less spiny scotch broom. I think I wrote to you before that it's providing habitat for the endangered Humboldt marten in Oregon's coastal dunes.
It is one of the great myths of NZ ecology, that Hugh was the first to recognise gorse as a Nurse crop. He was probably the first to manage it on a landscape scale, but the fact of its role can be found decades before in the the dsir bulletin of Tony Druce, vegetation of the Taita catchment
I come from the north of England and I well remember the gorse covering the moors (such as the infamous Ilkley Moor, which we often walked across when I was a kid). Gorse was certainly no fun to try and run through!
So interesting Melanie! I just moved to Portugal and was wondering what that yellow bush with all the brambles and thorns was. What's fascinating is that it's a big part of the eucalyptus forest near us and eucalyptus are nonnative to Portugal. They were introduced in the late 19th century and have become a huge "crop" here and a big part of the landscape. Anyway, I'm going to look at gorse differently now. Thanks for sharing!
This is a problem in Oregon, too. (And brooms, too). It’s constant work to control these horribly invasive weeds. Oddly enough we now have an invasive from New Zealand called bitty bitty. Lately we had invasive eastern grey squirrels destroying trees in my neighborhood. Whether brought in either on purpose …
Thank you Melanie, fascinating. Several points of connection here.
I spent my teen years in a house next to some open land on a chalk down near Portsmouth called Portsdown Hill. It had been cleared for sleep grazing, but these had not returned after WWII, so gorse was starting to grow. There were gorse fires every , likely started by careless smokers.
In 1969, the BBC ran a drama series called Take Three Girls. The theme tune was called Light Flight by Pentangle. I headed off to university that year and bought my first record player. The third album I bought was Basket of Light. I still have it. The next luxury I bought was an acoustic guitar. £10 in Woolworths. My parents are from Yorkshire and I had no idea that whin was gorse!
I sold my parents' house on the hill in 2018. By then, hawthorn bushes had grown up through the gorse which was largely gone.
Here in the PNW we introduced the related but less spiny scotch broom. I think I wrote to you before that it's providing habitat for the endangered Humboldt marten in Oregon's coastal dunes.
Thanks John. We have Scotch broom here too, it's pretty widespread and troublesome. Also hawthorn, that was another early European introduction.
It is one of the great myths of NZ ecology, that Hugh was the first to recognise gorse as a Nurse crop. He was probably the first to manage it on a landscape scale, but the fact of its role can be found decades before in the the dsir bulletin of Tony Druce, vegetation of the Taita catchment
Thanks Peter, that is what I found when I looked into it, although I couldn't get the Tony Druce reference.
I come from the north of England and I well remember the gorse covering the moors (such as the infamous Ilkley Moor, which we often walked across when I was a kid). Gorse was certainly no fun to try and run through!
Thanks David. I hope I'll see it where it's native one day.
So interesting Melanie! I just moved to Portugal and was wondering what that yellow bush with all the brambles and thorns was. What's fascinating is that it's a big part of the eucalyptus forest near us and eucalyptus are nonnative to Portugal. They were introduced in the late 19th century and have become a huge "crop" here and a big part of the landscape. Anyway, I'm going to look at gorse differently now. Thanks for sharing!
Gorse has quite the personality. It’s a mystery. Thx for introducing me to this stubborn shrub.
This is a problem in Oregon, too. (And brooms, too). It’s constant work to control these horribly invasive weeds. Oddly enough we now have an invasive from New Zealand called bitty bitty. Lately we had invasive eastern grey squirrels destroying trees in my neighborhood. Whether brought in either on purpose …
Interesting issue, Melanie! We don't have gorse here in the southern U.S. nor anything much like it. Those spines look very painful!