Silver birch avenue

The small, closely growing, silver birch avenue in this photograph must have been deliberately planted because it runs along the top of an embankment of a disused railway near the edge of the Forest of Dean. It is now one of the footpaths that runs from Cinderford's Linear Park into the forest. 

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Nikon P900

Autumnal silver birch

There are a number of striking trees in autumn - the lime trees with their yellow leaves, the beech with leaves that I suppose are orange but look like gold, and the acers seemingly capable of producing leaves of any colour or even any two colours. However, for subtlety the silver birch (Betula pendula) takes some beating. We came across this example as we walked home and the juxtaposition of the leaves and bark lit by the low sun was hard to resist.

 photos © T. Boughen     Camera: Lumix FZ1000 2

Siver birches and buildings

A tree that seems to me to have grown in popularity over the past fifty years is the silver birch. Where the Victorians and Edwardians had no qualms about planting London Plane, lime, horse chestnut and many other large trees in our cities and towns, in more recent times smaller trees have been favoured. Whitebeam and rowan now proliferate, but the architects' favourite is surely the silver birch. It is slender, blocks light less than many other trees and has attractive bark. What is often forgotten is that it sheds seeds and twigs copiously around its planting site. However, the delicate tracery of its branches against the rectilinear grid of glass curtain walls, as in this London example, is hard to beat, and architects are still choosing the tree in great numbers to complement their buildings.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Olympus OMD E-M10

Dog walkers and silver birches

Dog walkers feature in quite a few of my photographs, usually as a point of interest and scale. In fact, I've often given thanks for dog walkers because they have frequently provided the human interest and compositional element that makes a shot worth taking. Today's photograph is a case in point. An avenue of silver birches isn't a common occurrence in my experience. This one flanks a bank that separates two small lakes in a nature reserve. Without the dog walkers the shot (and the avenue) would be be empty: they contribute the extra element needed to complete it.

photo © T. Boughen     Camera: Sony DSC-RX100