Ash lane

This is a lane made from Fraxinus Excelsior, the European Ash. This tree is widely distributed over Europe and even over other places in the world. For the eye, it is a nice deciduous tree and often a valuable landscape contribution. Moreover, its wood is valuable and very popular for many purposes (there was even an ancient Volvo car with a car-frame made of Ash-wood). There is only one problem and that is its sensitivity for a particular fungus. If the tree is infected, it will accumulate branches without leaves and in the end it will die. The fungus is very much present in Belgium and the Netherlands since around 2012 (hence very recently). Nowadays, in rows of trees (not visible in this photo, but visible in the previous photo of this lane, taken from greater distance - flic.kr/p/2oJQL64), you will often see healthy trees and already affected trees.

However, some trees in some row’s will remain healthy even while most other trees are affected. These trees have a natural resistance against the fungus and can be used to breed new Ashes that also are resistant. With these techniques, when carefully executed, the Fraxinus Excelsior will stay with us in the landscape.

 

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