On Wed, 28 Jan 2004 16:01:06 +0000 (UTC), "PK"
wrote:

.... around 8 years ago I put down a play area (bark over fabric) on
what had been a well cultivated vegetable garden.

Kids are older, this winter's project is to convert the area to lawns &
fruit on the fence.

Dug the area last week - immedately under the textile was a mass of ash
roots from a tree afound 15/20m away. A little deeper (through soil that had
been veg plot) were ash roots up to an inch thick.

The seedlings are real buggers. look away for a minute and they are 3 feet
tall among the herbaceous plants and shrubs. Cut then off instead of
grubbing out and they take it as a chllenge worth responding to and grow
back with trebled vigour.

Oh, you must be talking about black walnut (for roots and hardy
saplings) or elm (for a million seedlings). :-)