A book as lovely as a tree

One of my husband's favourite pastimes, when he's not diving into the undergrowth hunting out mushrooms, is tree speculation. This consists of striding through the countryside confidently pointing out nearby Ash - or maybe Elder, or it could be oak ... He's a carpenter. If he didn't undermine his first declaration, I'd happily take him at his word. But I guess they look different with their leaves still on.

So you can imagine my pleasure to find A LITTLE GUIDE TO TREES nestled amongst a really lovely selection of books* in a giftshop in Walburswick. It's an Eden Project publication, written and charmingly illustrated in Edward Ardizzone-style by Charlotte Voake, and it's an absolute treat.

Each spread is dedicated to a different type of tree, with the distinctive leaf-shape easy to spot in the top right-hand corner, and tips on what to look out for in each season, along with titbits of knowledge. Did you know Alder is used to make clogs? Or that birch twigs make good broomsticks?

We spent a happy afternoon, measuring the height of a tree using nothing more than a friend and a pencil, and identifying - really, truly identifying, no more speculation for us, thank you - the trees we saw on our pre-lunch walk. Ever the Eden-minded naturalists, we took note of the book's advice to take the book to the tree, not the tree to the book, and didn't pick leaves. But the book is a little large for carrying on walks, so here's a tip: take photos while you're on your walk, return to pub carpark, get book out of car, and then happily occupy small offspring with matching pics to illustrations while you sup your pint of good local ale ...




*Snapped up two other treasures in the giftshop: for boat-building husband, Kipling's THE SHIPWRIGHT'S TRADE stirringly illustrated with woodcuts by James Dodds (a former boat-builder: perfect!) and KATIE MORAG DELIVERS THE MAIL. Little a captivated by both. A succesful book-hunting trip all round, and icing on the cake of a picture-perfect day at the seaside.