On Wed, 18 Jan 2012 11:20:13 -0000, "David WE Roberts"
wrote:


"john east" wrote in message
...
Just below warren street tube station, by about fifty yards on the west
side of Tottenham court road, is a hotel entrance with two olive trees,
one either side of the entrance.

The are each in clay pots about two foot six or so high and three feet
wide. The trunk of the tree is nine or ten inches in diameter and the
original height of the trees have been cut down to about seven feet high.

How would that have been done? Getting what would have once been a *huge*
tree into such a pot? Is it that the spread of roots on an olive tree is
very small, so they could have dug one up and trimmed the roots and then
got it in that size of pot? I would have thought trimming the roots to
that extent on a normal tree would result in its' death.

Or would it have been grown in such a small pot, but then i find it
amazing that such a big tree would have grown in one successfully?


I would vote for it being grown in the pot.
Think of it as a very large Bonsai.
The dimensions you give - 36" diameter by 30" high - are not small for a
pot.
Limiting the tree to 7 foot high will also limit the demand on the roots.
It may have been kept to a similar height for most of its life.

Don't knoe about olives, but small bonsai ("potensai") are often
planted in the ground, with a tile or something similar a short way
below, to stop tap roots going down. Then they are fed, watered and
trimmed for a few years to increase growth and girth. Then they are
lifted, root-pruned, top-pruned and potted ready for training.
I have seen olives with huge trunks in pots at the Eden project.
Somebody told me they are lifted from sites being cleared for building
etc. If they grow on shallow, stony soil, they may not make so much
root growth and take to being potted.

Pam in Bristol