Trees worth visiting

Coin Tree (Malham)

Coin tree

People have hammered copper coins into this dead tree trunk near Janet’s Foss waterfall for good luck for many years, and if you look closely you may find some very old pennies. This should never be done on a living tree as the coins will poison it. In Yorkshire we look after our pennies (because ‘the pounds then look after themselves’) so perhaps there is something to this tale! You can also find a money tree at Bolton Abbey.

The Laund Oak & Valley of Desolation (Bolton Abbey, Wharfedale)

Recording the details
of the Laund Oak

This wonderful tree is over 800 years old and thought to have been named after John of Laund who was the Prior from 1286 to 1330. The foresters on the Estate say it produces some of the best acorns, which grow into fine trees. (Please keep to footpaths.)

The tranquil valley nearby owes its name to the devastation caused by the great storm in 1826. Nature has long since repaired the damage and, in 1999, eight thousand new trees were planted. Follow the trail up the valley and see how the landscape has changed since the last Ice Age retreated, including the spectacular waterfalls it created. (Sorry, no dogs allowed on footpath.)

NB Visitors must park at the Cavendish Pavilion or Sand Holme car parks, or in the village and walk up; there is no parking on site.

Weeping beech

Weeping Beech (St Botolphs Church, Horsehouse, Coverdale)

This beautiful churchyard tree has a 30 metre wide canopy. The church was established around 1530 and the tree is thought to be about 150 years old.

The coppiced hazel of Freeholders’ Wood (Aysgarth Falls, Wensleydale)

Coppicing is a traditional form of woodland management, practised in the past to produce considerable quantities of thin, straight poles that would have found a ready market as firewood and for fencing and lath work. The freeholders of the nearby village of Carperby have an ancient and exclusive right to take away the wood.

Hazel

For maximum benefit to wildlife a woodland needs to have a variety of places for them to live - thick cover for nesting birds, open glades for flowers and feeding birds, tall, mature trees, and dead wood for hole-nesting birds, insects and fungi. Coppicing allows a much wider range of plants, birds and insects to flourish than would in purely mature woodland.

Parking is at Aysgarth Falls National Park Centre which has information and displays describing the historic and current management of this important woodland.

Alder pollards of Ivelet Common (Swaledale)

Alder tree

Take a walk from Muker to Keld, but rather than following the Pennine Way, take the footpath which keeps to the northern side of the Swale. The ancient Ivelet Woods contain many veteran birch and hazel but the star of the show is a grove of veteran pollarded alders near West Arn Gill. Historically, these trees were managed to provide wood for charcoal whilst grazing was allowed beneath them.

Juniper

Juniper by Ingleborough

Juniper is rare and declining and one of only three conifer species native to Britain. The best place to see it in the Yorkshire Dales National Park is on Moughton Common in the south west which has stunning views of the mountains Ingleborough and Pen-y-ghent. Public rights of way lead to it from Austwick and Horton-in-Ribblesdale. Find out more about what we are doing to look after juniper at www.natureinthedales.org.uk/juniper

The Wishing Tree (Flintergill, Dentdale)

Wishing Tree

This oak may make your dreams come true! Part of its root system has been washed away to create a natural arch. It is said that if you walk under and around it three times clockwise and make a wish, it will be granted.