NATURE NOTES

Last week we visited The Oatlands Plantation, near Leesburg, Virginia.  We have lived here for years and have passed the entrance I can't remember how many times, but this is the first time we visited.  After a friend told us about taking her granddaughter, and when Gregg said we should take a ride somewhere, I suggested Oatlands.  

We didn't actually tour the house, but were more interested in walking around their extensive garden.  This post for Michelle's Natures Notes is about the magnificent trees we found there.  Other posts will follow about the garden.

The tree in the photo above is called a Yellow Buckeye.   According to the website page, it says it is "Perhaps the most beautiful of the buckeyes, it has yellow flowers borne on erect panicles in early spring.  Since colonial times, buckeyes have been carried by many school children and adults as good luck charms, even though they are poisonus.  Cultivated 1764 - Aesculus octandra - Virginia Native."  The Buckey leaf is below.

The Osage Orange

I love the bark on this tree.

Again from the website, "Osage Orange.  While George Carter was building his house and plantation at Oatlands, this tree was notated in the Lewis & Clark expedition journal on March 26, 1804 in St. Louis, Missouri.  From the wood, native Americans made archery bows and early settlers made a yellow dye for fabric that was extracted from the root bark.  Before barbed wire was introduced, rows of these thorny trees were planted as living fences/hedges.  Cultivated 1818 - Maclura pomifer - Native."

Shagbark Hickory

The tree in the photo above and below fascinated me.  I had never seen anything like it before, the way its bark peeled away from the trunk.  The description on this one read, "The Shagbark Hickory.  Not just another hickory tree at Oatlands.  This large specimen flaunts foot-long shingles warping away from the trunk.  The nuts were highly prized by Native Americans and early settlers.  In autumn our squirrels rush to their droppings.  Cultivated 1629 - Carva ovata - VA native."

Bald Cypress

"Next to the Osage Orange is a cone-bearing deciduous conifer that naturally thrives in swamps.  In the fall, bronze needles drop in a rusty carpet below.  This type of tree can live over one thousand years, and its durable timber has been known as "the wood eternal."  Cultivated 1640 - Taxodium distichum - Virginia Native"

There are other trees at the plantation and you can read them at this link.

The Oatlands Plantation exceeded expectations.  We are definitely going to be adding this on our places-to-go list.  Leave that place and you will definitely want to hug a tree.  I'd like to end with this.

Prayer of the Woods

"I am the heat of your hearth on the cold winter nights, the friendly shade screening you from the summer sun, and my fruits are refreshing draughts
 quenching your thirst as you journey on. I am the beam that holds your house, the board of your table, the bed on which you lie, and the timber that builds your boat. I am the handle of your hoe, the door of your homestead, the wood of your cradle 
and the shell of your coffin. I am the bread of kindness and the flower of beauty. "Ye who pass by, listen to my prayer.  Harm me not."

(I don't know the author but I read that this prayer has been used in the Portuguese forest preservations for more than 1,000 years.  I hope someone can verify this.  It is a lovely prayer.)

I am joining Nature Notes, with my thanks to Michelle for hosting this wonderful meme.   You can click on the link below to visit Michelle's blog and to visit the other participants.

Nature Notes