Plant a Tree and Retree the World by Ben Raskin

Author:Ben Raskin
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Leaping Hare Press
Published: 2022-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Hazel

Corylus

Hazel is especially versatile and all the more useful for not growing into a massive tree. It can be grown as a specimen even in modest gardens, producing delicious nuts, though saving them from being scoffed by squirrels in the UK is always a challenge. Hazel is perfectly suited to coppicing, with new shoots growing very straight from the base.

Good for: nuts, timber, wildlife

Hazel has big, flat, soft, hairy leaves, with a smooth brownish-grey bark. The catkins, which are the male flowers, are a striking characteristic and, if tapped at the right time, will produce a cloud of pollen. By contrast, the female flowers are tiny and red, almost invisible. Both male and female flowers are found on the same tree (this is called monoecious).

Left to grow unpruned, the hazel has a typical tree shape that a child might draw. When coppiced, however, it produces a more compact bush. How often to coppice depends on what you want to produce and how good your soil is. Five-year cutting is normally the minimum for making hurdles and bean poles. If growing for firewood, a 10–15-year cycle is more suitable. Coppiced hazel is also great for wildlife, providing shorter understory in mixed woodlands, and is an especially good habitat for the dormouse. Young coppiced growth is used for fencing hurdles, walking sticks, thatching spars and bean poles. Thicker timber is used for woodfuel.

Hazelnuts are a staple crop for many countries and likely to become more common as a protein alternative to meat in our diets. Southern Europe and the Middle East have typically been the main hazelnut producers, though they grow well in more northern climates too.

Hazel was one of the woods used traditionally by water diviners, with its combination of strength and flexibility. In Celtic mythology, hazel also has a strong association with water, with nine hazel trees supposedly growing around the well of wisdom. In Norse mythology, the hazel is associated with wisdom.

In the 1860s a contorted form of hazel was found, probably in a hedge, in Tortworth, south Gloucestershire in the west of England, just 32 km (20 miles) from where I live. This tree was the origin of all the specimens of contorted hazel grown around the world, which are mostly now grafted onto a straight plant for added vigour. We have one in our garden, and named our dog after it.

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