Cumbria’s Charming Cherry

The idea was to take a little detour on our way home from Penrith to find another of Cumbria’s Top 50 Trees.

But things are never quite so simple. It didn’t help that, coming out of Maulds Meaburn, we missed the turning we needed and took the next one – the wrong one. It wasn’t until we had trudged down a muddy farm track, walked through a farm and reached a far muddier field, that we decided, either we were wrong, or it wasn’t worth it anyway. As we returned to the car, a farmer called down from his tractor and asked if he could help. He soon figured which tree we after and pointed out the right road.

So, we drove down the right track and arrived at some houses. We parked and then Gordon went to ask at one of the houses if it was okay to park and was greeted by a very nice man who said it was fine and then pointed out the tree and showed us how to get to it.

We were astonished when we saw it in the middle of a field. This is the oldest and biggest Wild Cherry Tree (Prunus avium) in the UK. It is 16.4m high and, although no one actually knows how old it is, it is thought to be at least 150 years old and is probably more than this – the Woodland Trust have described it as a Veteran. Of course this is not really the time of year to see a cherry tree, as apparently in the Spring it is covered in blossom, but who wants to see blossom when you can see a trunk like this. Incredible! (Gordon says it reminds him of Game of Thrones – but I wouldn’t know, as I have never seen it.) I have put a picture of the whole tree in extras.

This is Number 4 in the Top 50. So that is two down and only another 48 to go!