"Cerumen" wrote in message
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"Jaques d'Alltrades" wrote in message
k...
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from "Cerumen" contains these
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W. Keble Martin says: "an ancient introduction." (Concise British
Flora

Yes and a recent native woodland survey here refused to include
woodland
with sycamore (and many other common trees) as native which was why
it
sprang to mind.

By 'ancient' I would understand neolithic times. How picky can you get?

I'm not picky, those who did the survey were. Apparently if it wasn't here
before we were isolated by water it's not native.


I am not sure when Sycamores appeared in Ireland. I thought they were
relatively recent.
You can usually tell clearly with trees from the pollen record if tey are
recent or ancient.
Compared to the dwindling stock of native oak/ash/elm(remains of) woodland,
sycamore is a weed.
It is not that picky. There are other species that are clearly not native
like Limes (I am just talking about Ireland) where people will not really
care much either way as they are fine trees. Sycamores are not worth the
effort as they are invasive and do not make for good diverse woodland flora.
I am not asying they should all be chopped down but I do not think they are
worth preserving and in cases where they are encoraching on the remaining
native woodland, there are good grounds for clearing them out. Irish
oakwooods in teh SW are in a precarious state. There are only a handful of
decent sites and they are badly treatened by Rhododendron to begin with.
Sycamore and laurel do not help either.


--

Chris Thomas
West Cork
Ireland