One of the loveliest effects of the wet, humid weather has been the unusually dramatic Lammas Burst or Lammas Spurt or whatever you like to call it, in oak trees. Suddenly you find new shoots, with delicate orange-gold leaves breaking out all over the trees. A wonderful contrast to the deep green of the older leaves. The oak gives good value to the tree watcher. Slow, slow this year in producing and swelling its acorns - here in the east anyway - and once again afflicted with that wretched knopper gall.
Everyone knows from childhood up of the round gall which in autumn turns brown. It's the marble gall, not to be confused with the oak apple. There is a fat grub at the centre which is pleasing to tits and other birds which choose to break it open - not difficult. Not much harm to the tree. But the knopper gall, which covers the whole acorn with a whirly green heavy excrescence, in shape not unlike the whirl of cream on top of your ice or cake, kills that one acorn. The tree goes on, but any number of acorns may be affected.
The gall comes from an only recently-known gall-fly which has one remarkable factor in its cycle. That is, that some part of its development must be spent in a Turkey oak. There may not be a Turkey oak within 10 miles, but this gall-fly will find it out. So the experts tell us. But oak can endure a lot. There are many sorts of galls and yet the tree survives. As some put it, the oak "plays host" to many insects and animals and birds. Not to mention fungi and humans. According to Ralph Whitlock, author of a book on the subject, when Bismarck felt low, he would stand for half-anhour with his back against the trunk of a great oak, apparently absorbing something of its strength. North Americans, too, used the oak in the same manner, writes Whitlock. And, some sensitive people claim they have heard the oak singing, much as telegraph wires are heard to do.
Back to those lovely, long pinkyorange Lammas shoots, some of them a yard long already. This warm weather may bring mildew to their tender tips. But the philosopher says: "Mildew must be part of the scheme of things". Be grateful that you have oaks, and growing well. They are survivors.