On 22/04/2018 16:58, Jeff Layman wrote:
On 22/04/18 07:49, Chris Hogg wrote:
On Sat, 21 Apr 2018 22:15:58 +0100, Jeff Layman

The ash tree providing all the seed is at the north boundary of our
garden. It is about 18m high, and is a very attractive tree, even when
leafless in winter. I estimate that it produces around 2 million seeds a
year.

My late mother's garden, soon to be my garden in a few weeks time,
suffers from myrtle seedlings, from a neighbour's hedge. The neighbour
is two-doors away, but the birds eat the berries and spread the seeds
everywhere, which germinate readily. Even so, nothing like your ash!

Just spent the afternoon pulling up 1500 seedlings. That would be bad
enough, but only 1200 were from unweeded beds. The other 300 were from
beds cleared on Friday!

The problem is that you can't leave them to get past the cotyledon
stage. Once the true leaves appear the root gets really long. and if you
pull the stem it often just breaks and from that new leaves form. That
doesn't appear to happen with the cotyledon stage.

A bit of a digression but still about Ash. when I was a child there was
an old saw:
Ash before Oak we will have a soak. Oak before Ash we will have a splash.
For the first time in my memory, here anyway in North Staffordshire the
Ash is in leaf before the Oak. Lets hope is id nonsense.