We were delighted to welcome Baroness Barbara Young of Old Scone, who is Chair of The Woodland Trust, to King’s.
Baroness Young visited us on March 14th with members of staff from the trust – the UK’s largest woodland conservation charity – to admire the Great London Plane Tree of Ely, which has called our Old Palace Garden its home for more than 300 years.
As many of you will know, the magnificent specimen is Britain’s biggest and possibly oldest London Plane Tree. Following the ravages of the Civil War, restoration projects in Cambridgeshire included the Bishop’s Palace, and it was following the Palace’s refurbishment in 1674 that the tree was gifted to and planted by the Bishop of Ely at the time, Peter Gunning.
In June 2002 and in celebration of the late Queen’s Golden Jubilee, The Tree Council designated the tree as one of the ‘Top 50 British Trees’, and it even has its place in national heritage. In 2012, King’s took over custody of the tree and it is thanks to the expertise and care of our Gardens and Grounds Team, with support from Barcham Trees, who are based just south of Ely, that the tree continues to flourish.
Baroness Young met with our Chair of Governors, Mr David Day; our Chief Operating Officer, Mr Mark Hart; and our Grounds and Gardens Manager, Mr Will Temple, to discuss the importance and beauty of the tree, as well as Baroness Young’s Heritage Trees Private Members Bill, which had its first reading in the House of Lords in December. The Bill was developed in response to the felling of the Sycamore Gap tree in Northumberland last September, and it would give protected legal status to the country’s oldest and most special trees!
You can read more about the Bill here: https://campaigns.woodlandtrust.org.uk/page/99702/petition/1