Thinking in tree time

I used to think of trees as permanent.

We moved into our current house with the intention of staying. It’s the house we’ll grow old in. Early on, we planted two trees at the end of the garden: a wattle and a she-oak.

The wattle was short-lived, brought down by a storm. That didn’t surprise me. The she-oak was different. It had shot up to maybe 20 metres high. Then one storm and it was gone. Maybe we should think of some trees as companions for five years, not forever.

I love walnuts. Some of my early memories are of visiting my grandmother’s house. Next door was a huge walnut tree. I love eating walnuts and had always wanted to plant a walnut tree. Walnuts fruit after about 5 years and become really productive after 25 years.

Twenty-five years used to feel like a long time. As we get older, our sense of time changes, what once seemed distant now feels more immediate. Lately, I’ve been asking: what can we do now that will matter 25 years from today?

We planted a walnut tree just before COVID-19. I’ve been calling it “Ella’s tree”, after our five-year-old granddaughter. Its timeline fits more naturally with her life than mine. It’s a plan for her future.

We’ve now got about 50 fruit trees, and I’d been thinking about the walnut. It had grown fast, shooting upward, but it wasn’t forming the kind of shape a walnut tree needs to last. I mentioned this to the person who helps us with pruning, just to get a sense of what might be possible.

A few weeks later, after she and Kirsty had talked it over, they came back with a suggestion: “We think it needs to go.” When I asked why, the answer was simple: “It’s going to take over the garden.”

That was exactly the point. I wanted it to take over, just not yet. In 20 years, I’d pictured it as the defining element in that part of the garden. I made a few comments about their lack of long-term thinking, but I said I’d take some time to think it through.

A few days later, I spent some time just looking at it. One strong branch had stretched out over the greenhouse, which we built in 2020. It hadn’t grown in a way that would support its long-term structure. The space we gave it had shaped how it grew. It looked less like a tree built to last and more like one trying to find space that wasn’t there.

We’ve now cut it down.

It’s been a reminder that long-term thinking matters, but it has to be backed by good decisions in the short and medium term. It’s not enough to imagine what things might look like in 25 years. We need to make sure the next five help us get there.

We still need to find the right place to plant another walnut tree.