On 5/7/2008 3:53 PM, Way Back Jack wrote:
TV documentaries and travelogues reveal a lot of lush "green" in those
countrysides but a relative scarcity of trees. Is it climate? Too
windy in Ireland? Sheep and/or other livestock?

I read somewhere (I think it might have been in Winston Churchill's "A
History of the English-Speaking Peoples") that a medieval king of
England ordered the planting of oaks so that a later generation might
have the raw materials to build war ships. However, trees take up land
that might instead be used for crops or pastures.

On my own standard tract lot, I have 14 trees. Some are trees only in
name. Three are dwarf citrus and will never be tree-like. But nine of
them are truly trees in size and shape.

--
David E. Ross
Climate: California Mediterranean
Sunset Zone: 21 -- interior Santa Monica Mountains with some ocean
influence (USDA 10a, very close to Sunset Zone 19)
Gardening pages at http://www.rossde.com/garden/