Newbattle Abbey College

The Ancient Woodlands of Newbattle

Newbattle has been a famous tree place for over two centuries, particularly for its chestnuts, beeches and sycamores. This information, compiled in the Autumn of 1998, lists the 28 most interesting trees now in the grounds. For good ecological reasons the native tree flora of Britain is minute, being confined to 35 species. By way of compensation some 1700 tree species from across the non-tropical world grow happily somewhere in these islands. Trees from the west of North America, from Japan, from parts of China and from the Caucausus grow particularly well. The climate of Scotland is a home-from-home for trees from the north western seaboard of the USA and Canada. Sitka spruce, Douglas fir, Grand fir and many others grow better in Perthshire than anywhere west of the Rockies or throughout continental Europe. Although not introduced until the first half of the last century, many are now in their prime. The figure quoted is the girth of the tree in feet and inches, measured 5′ above the ground. Where this is not feasible, the point of measurement is stated. Though Britain is officially metric, it remains convenient to measure trees in imperial, both in order to make comparison with earlier records and because it means more to the generation most likely to be interested.

1. Sycamore – Acer pseudoplatanus. To Americans this is the Sycamore maple. To older Scots it is a Plane. Under whatever name, it has been noted as an ornament to Newbattle for centuries. It may date from 1550 and certainly joins the group of large, handsome, old sycamores in central Scotland. A tree at Corstorphine in Edinburgh, for example, has a planting date before 1600. A tree at Tyninghame is 26′ round. Sycamores come from continental Europe but get on exceptionally, surprisingly well in these windy islands, right down to the coast and up into the hills. This tree was measured in 1904 as 95′ high, with a girth of 16′. It was 18′ round but had been dying back at the top for a decade or so unfortunately it was blown down on May 11th 2006 at 5pm, just a few days after inspection by tree surgeons following concerns about the tree’s condition, a freak gust of wind from the north blew the tree down across the main drive. Fortunately, nobody was underneath.
2. Western Red Cedar - Thuja plicata. 3′4″. One sniff is enough to identify this tree which grows from Alaska to California and as Far East as Idaho. It smells to me of those pineapple sweets we used to get as children. It grows fast in youth and middle age and is often found in gardens, parks, cemeteries and small plantations. This tree is no longer there the stump remains.
3. Small Leaved Lime – Tilia cordata. 4′5″. This is a British native, though probably not in the Lothians. It is readily separated from other limes, whether in flower or in fruit, because both stand above the shoot, albeit often rather limply, and with up to 10 flowers in a cluster. The leaves tend to be quite small, quite round and quite blue-green underneath. Isolated trees, at Arniston, for example, not far away, can reach a girth of 10-11 feet so this tree has plenty of growth in it yet, upwards and outwards.
4. Red Oak – Quercus rubra. 2′8″. This is the only oak from North America that grows really well in Britain and just as well north of the Border as south. One of the largest with a girth of 15′ is near Dundee and there are substantial trees in the Royal Botanic Garden in Edinburgh and Carberry, near Musselburgh. It is immediately separable from our native oaks by the smooth stem and much bigger leaves. The only possible confusion is with the Scarlet Oak, Quercus coccinea, also from North America but much less often encountered. Both are relatively short-lived.
5. Norway Maple – Acer platanoides. 3′8″. Often confused with sycamore, although the bark is quite different and the lobes of the leaves are drawn out into fine points. They are numerous at Newbattle and very welcome for their fresh green foliage in the spring, their shapely form and their good autumn colour – usually butter-yellow but sometimes red and oranges. Like Sycamore this is a European native with a huge natural distribution. It only just missed crossing the ice bridge before Britain was cut off.
6. Farges’s Fir - Abies chengii. 5′2″. This is the most surprising tree in the list. Identification was confirmed by Keith Rushforth, an expert in this genus, who was at Newbattle 30 odd years ago to plant what is a very rare tree indeed. There are two trees at Dawyck, near Peebles – planted in 1923 – and one in the RBG but few anywhere else. This is a handsome fir from Szechwan and Hupeh, in general shape like an Abies veitchii, the upper branches horizontal, the lower sweeping gently down until upswept at their ends. The diagnostic features are the hairless, rich deep red shoots and the gloss needles, short on top, longer at the sides, notably bifid. Cut the needle across and you will see that the resin canals are median. The tree was ‚Äòdiscovered’ by Pere Farges, introduced to the USA by Wilson in 1901 and to Britain in about 1907. So, a pleasant mystery.
7. Yew - Taxus baccata. c11′. What everybody knows about Yew trees is true. They can stay alive for very much longer than any other European tree. It is, however, often impossible to assign a reliable date – not least because the largest, presumably oldest, trees are hollow. The Great Yew of Ormiston, not far from Newbattle, is first mentioned in 1474, when it must already have been a noticeable tree. It had a girth of 18′ in 1834 and is now 20′ round and entirely healthy. By these standards the avenue of Yews at Newbattle contains comparative youngsters, probably good for another 500 years. Each tree is either male or female.
8. Large Leaved Lime - Tilia platyphyllos. 5′4″. This is accepted by the experts as a native tree but only in a smallish area in south-west England. Given a fertile deep soil it will grow very well in the north and can make a big handsome dome as at, for example, the entrance gate to Scone Palace, near Perth. It is easily recognisable in flower or in fruit because both hang down in bunches of 3. The fruit tends to stay brown on the branch tips long after the leaves are shed. The large-leaved and the small-leaved have produced a hybrid which is a deal more common that either of the parents and, indeed, is usually called the Common Lime. The remains of the Lime avenue at Newbattle are of this tree, as is usually the case.
9. Leyland Cypress – x Cupressocyparis leylandii. c4′. This wonder-hybrid arose naturally at Leighton Hall near Welshpool, a little over a century ago. The parents are North American trees but with a natural distribution thousands of miles apart. The Monterey Cypress is confined to that peninsula in California; the Nootka Cypress spreads from Alaska into northern Oregon. What makes the Leyland Cypress extraordinary is, in the words of the late Alan Mitchell, its “ability to outgrow any plant on almost any soil in almost any situation”. These attributes make it intolerable when planted in a daft location, but that is not the fault of the tree. Fortunately this fine young specimen at the gate to the College can grow and grow to its – and our – heart’s content.
10. Highclere Holly – Ilex x altaclerensis. 4′10″. There are a good many hollies at Newbattle which, like Yew, are very valuable in giving form and colour throughout the year. Some are the native Holly, Ilex aquifolia, often in variety. Some are versions of this fine hybrid between the native and the Madeira Holly. These Highclere Hollies, named after the garden in Hampshire where many were raised, tend to be vigorous, with big glossy leaves, often without spines. Putting a definitive name to any of the numerous varieties is hazardous. This may be Camelliifolia – meaning with leaves like a Camelia.
11. Box - Buxus sempervirens. Not much of a tree perhaps, but about as big as you are going to find box in Scotland, although it is common as a hedging plant or a piece of topiary. Not everyone likes the curious, sweetish, mousey smell – strongest after rain – but it is very distinctive, as are the neat oval shining leaves, the way they are massed and the brown reticulated bark. The wood of box is yellow, hard, heavy and ever-grained. It was the preferred special for wood engraving.
12. European Larch - Larix decidua. 7′4″. Of all the trees introduced into Scotland, this is perhaps the happiest. It looks well at all seasons. In spring the fresh green needles are elegantly set on straw-coloured twigs, enhanced by cherry-red female flowers. In autumn the pure gold of the changing crown is more arresting than anything other than Birch or the occasional Aspen. In winter the set of the tree combines strength with gentleness. Because the canopy is light and the tree deciduous, there is a rich ground flora under a Larch wood. The timber is first-class. European Larch is a mountain tree, particularly from the Alps. It was not brought to Scotland until 1725 – three of the original trees are still there, at Dawyck and at Kailzie, both near Peebles.
13. Western Hemlock - Tsuga heterophylla. 7′5″. There are only 9 species of Hemlock in the world – 1 in the Himalayas, 4 in Eastern Asia and 4 in North America. The first into Britain was the Eastern Hemlock which grows from Canada to Alabama. That was in 1736. It is occasionally encountered; a dark, smallish, spreading tree. We had to wait until the 1860s before the Western Hemlock became widely available. Now it is everywhere across Scotland – amongst the tallest and, perhaps, the most shapely conifers in the new landscape. To grow and look their very best as old tree, Hemlocks need more moisture than is available on the east coast, but these three trees still look fine. There is a fourth, younger tree in the centre of the grass.
14. Lawson’s Cypress - Chamaecyparis lawsoniana. 5′3″. This Cypress, or strictly false Cypress, is named on this side of the Atlantic for the Lawson who was an Edinburgh 19th century nurseryman and introduced the tree. At home in Oregon, it is the Port Orford Cedar – a famous timber in its day particularly as a coffin wood for its combination of durability, colour and scent. Some say that scent is a combination of roses and ginger. In Europe, although the type of tree can be seen often enough, the chief role of Lawson’s Cypress is in the garden or near landscape in one of its bewildering varieties of size, shape, texture and colour – everything from gold through green to ice blue. Oddly enough this propensity for huge variation only became apparent in European nurseries.
15. Deodar - Cedrus deodara. 7′2″. There are only 4 true Cedars in the world. One in Cyprus, one, the best known, in Lebanon, a third in the Atlas Mountains in Morocco and this tree from the Himalayas. It is readily separable from the others because the needles are at least half as long again and because the Deodar does not assume a flat top. There is, however, quite a degree of variation within the species. These adjacent trees exhibit some of that variation, from conical to the persistent single trunk characteristic of the Himalayan stands.
16. Austrian Pine (Black Pine) - Pinus nigra. 8′8″. Black Pine has a huge distribution across southern Europe into Asia Minor. Across the range, the form of the tree varies a good deal so that botanists have divided the species into varieties. One variety is characterised by the tree having not one but a number of close vertical stems – in its most extreme form like organ pipes. The variety comes from the Crimea and the Caucausus and has been given the name var. caramanica. The Newbattle tree may be one such. However, a willingness to grow in unpromising places is shared with the more common var. nigra or Austrian Pine. Both seem indifferent to soil, unless it is too wet, and too windy, so that they have often been used as most effective wind breaks. The tallest Austrian Pine in Britain is at Dawyck – 130 feet in the air.
17. Oregon Maple - Acer macrophyllum. 8′2″. The only Oregon Maple to rival this in height or girth is a tree in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Edinburgh. Oregon Maple is something of a misnomer since the tree has an enormous natural range from Alaska to California and from the coast in to the foothills, albeit it is perhaps at its natural best around Puget Sound and the lower Columbie River. It is both a tall understorey to the coniferous forest and a tree of roadsides, small town, farm lots and the like. The leaves are huge, the largest of any Maple, but like all Maples subtly arranged to catch the light.
18. English Oak - Quercus robur. 10′10″. There are two oaks native to Britain – Q. robur and Q. petraea. Since both have a large variation of detail within the species, it is often difficult to be sure which is which. The most secure feature is the Acorn – when available. The Robur acorn is on a stalk or peduncle; the Petraea acorn is sessile or set more or less directly on the stem. This tree, however, not only has the heavy horizontal limbs of a typical Robur, but the characteristic features of the leaf. These are 4-5 lobes each side, a short leaf stalk and strongish ears or auricles where the leaf reaches the stalk. Robur is the tree of the lowlands, including the Scottish lowlands, being quite happy on heavy soils provided they are not too wet. Potentially it has a lifespan of 500 years, eventually making the massive tree symbolic of dogged endurance. Given that this is the original native dominant tree of the area, there are surprisingly few around.
19. Dawn Redwood - Metasequoia glyptostroboides. 3′7″. The discovery of this tree by Forester T. Kay in eastern Szechuan in 1941 was, and is, in the exact sense, astonishing. It is difficult to credit (though we must) that a species which had been extinct for millions of years, had survived all along. If that can be accepted, it is easy to believe that generations of botanists had missed the 1000 odd trees. Once discovered, the tree had to await naming and distribution until 1948 – but in that year there was a massive distribution of seed. This seed germinated so freely that now Dawn Redwood can be found in virtually every collection and in many gardens. For quickest growth it needs more summer warmth that Scotland can provide, but the northern trees are as shapely as they are interesting. Some trees, like this one, have deep fluting; some don’t.
20. Poplars - Populus spp. This is a good position from which we see three different Poplars. Hybrids The tallest trees in the clump are hybrids, one of the numerous crosses between the European Populus nigra and the American Populus deltoids. They are probably the cultivar Serotina. Populas Tremula On the edge of the native Populus tremula. Unlike virtually every other Poplar, aspens do not come readily from cuttings. These may well be root suckers from an older tree now gone. Over by the west fence and behind the house are some Balsam Poplars – not the most handsome of the trees perhaps but always to be forgiven for the wonderful compelling scent they give off in the spring, or, at close quarters over most of the year, from buds. Be careful; the resin dabbed on the nostrils may persist for 24 hours or longer.
21. London Plane – Platanus x acerifolia. 4′6″. This is the first inter-continental hybrid tree, being the offspring of the great Oriental Plane, Platanus orientalis of Asia Minor and Platanus occidentalis from America. The first London Planes planted in about 1680 are still healthy, vigorous and enormous – one at the Bishop’s Palace, Ely; the other at Ranelagh Park, Barnes, near the Thames. It is the tallest broadleaf in Britain and looks likely to be the longest-lived. It is the tree, par excellence, of London Squares, of Paris and of just about every French town south of Paris. Scotland is not the place to see big Planes, though the hybrid and the parents grow cheerfully enough in Edinburgh.
22. Beech - Fagus sylvatica. The European Beech does not come much better than this at nearly 100′ high, 19′ round and with a splendid crown. The Lothians, particularly Tyninghame, Prestonhall, Yester, Arniston and Newbattle have been famous for Beech for centuries past, for no discernible reason. Indeed it is lightly curious, given that the nearest natural home of Beech is on chalky soils in southern England. Beech are shallow-rooted trees and somewhat brittle, so prone to be blown over or to have limbs blown off rather than dying from old age like Oaks. What keeps them upright is not the depth but the width of the rootplate. As Thomas Hardy knew, there are few natural sounds to compare with a full-crowned Beech caught in a full-throated winter gale – preferably by moonlight.
23. Cedar of Lebanon - Cedrus libani. c.4′. Most conifers produce varieties which are dwarf or fastigiated or weeping or differing in some way from the form or the colour of natural tree. Some produce innumerable varieties; some produce few. The Cedar of Lebanon is one of the latter. This is, however, a dwarf form of that majestic tree. It may be Nana or Comte de Dijon or something else.
24. Sorbus alnifolic. 4′4″ @ 4′. This is the only tree in the 28 without an English name, perhaps because, by the time it was growing in Britain, from 1892 onwards, gardeners were supersaturated with the new plants from the Far East – Japan, Korea and China. Without an English name it did not become a popular tree; without popular demand, nurserymen did not stock it …. the process is circular. So Newbattle is fortunate to have such an elegant tree, interesting in flower, leaf, fruit and tracery. It is first cousin to the Rowans and Whitebeams; it looks like a hornbeam and the Latin specific name means “leaf like an Alder”. Suggestions for an apt and memorable English name are very welcome.
25. Pencil Cedar - Jumiperus virginiana. 7′ @ 2′. There are two Junipers reasonably often encountered across Britain which have ’spreading sprays of minute, oppressed, dark green scales combined with tufts of acicular leaves.’ One is the Chinese Juniper; the other is the Pencil Juniper from a vast zone of the eastern Americas though equally vastly diminished by the pencil industry. The acicular, meaning needle-like, juvenile leaves are to be found at the top of the shoot rather than, in the Chinese tree, at the bottom. The smell of the foliage is quite distinctive but goodness knows how to describe it.
26. Beech - Fagus sylvatica. Sir Thomas Dick Lauder wrote “Professor Walker measured a Beech at Newbottle (sic) Abbey on the 6 July 1789; its trunk, where thickest, was seventeen feet in girth and the span of branches was eighty-nine feet. He thinks it must have been planted between 1540 and 1560. It was blown down a short time before the year 1809″. So there was a long pedigree of Beech at Newbattle before this tree reached a girth of 26′, the largest in Scotland, only to be blown down in 1952. The lower branches had layered – meaning rooted where they touched the ground – sometime last century, as is apparent from a photograph taken by Valentines of Dundee on 1 March 1939. *There is now a circle of 14 stems, the largest having a girth of 9′.
27. Spanish Chestnut – Castanea sativa. c.24′. There are marked as 27b on the map, 3 Spanish Chestnuts to the left of the drive as you come in ( marked 27b on the map) and this tree, (27a on the map) behind the house. All are a fair size and difficult to measure with any precision at this stage. Sativus means ‘cultivated’ and is contrasted with agrestis or sylvestris meaning ‘from the wild’. The Sweet Chestnut is Mediterranean in origin, but so widely planted for its nuts that the original distribution is obscure. In Scotland it has been used only for ornament and has grown remarkably well. This a tree at Strathpeffer with a planting date of 1550 which is 25′6″ in girth and still with a full crown. There is a healthy tall stump of a Chestnut at Melville Castle on the other side of Dalkeith, somewhat perversely known as ‘Rizzio’s Oak’ which is 24′7″. It is therefore, quite feasible that this tree started life while Mary, Queen of Scots was in Edinburgh. This is also known as the Sweet Chestnut
28. Horse Chestnut - Aesculus hippocastanum. 12′8″. Although the Horse Chestnut is near constant across the towns and villages of Britain, it is not a native. It grows naturally only in very limited mountain areas in the Balkans and has been in Britain for less than 400 years. Growth tends to be very rapid in the early years and slow or very slow thereafter so that it is often impossible to attach a reliable date to any tree. Because the Chestnuts (‘cheggies’ in Scots or ‘conkers’ in English) are of such importance to small boys, trees are always well known in the locality. This indeed has the local name of ‘Mother and 3 Daughters’. Alas, the American grey squirrel now tends to move in on the crop of chestnuts before they are fully ripe, thus depriving small boys and the rest of us an annual pleasure.
29. Irish Yew - Taxus Baccata Fastigiata. A common sight in almost any churchyard in Great Britain. Shape of tree changes from East coast to West coast, with East coast bushes being flatter and broader (as seen here) whilst bushes on the West coast tend to be more upright and narrow.

* Copies came to me from James Paterson, the great tree man from Nairn.
* Alistair Scott: March 1999
* Updated 2007 by the Forestry Commission of Scotland and Newbattle Abbey College

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