N48            Tree Lover

Today I watched a documentary film on CCTV. The title is “  The Ancient Dove  Tree”. Lately I have been one of the citizens who has awareness and concerns about our  environment. So forests and trees have become one of my interests, and have been expressing my concerns about them in my blogs and facebook.This is the only thing I can do . My wishes about trees are to limit cutting and do replanting more intensively. Tree planting ceremonies in towns and cities to mark the tree planting season will not be enough . Trees need to be grown in the inner country where logging had taken place widely.

        

Another thing I have been thinking lately is to introduce new trees to our country. The documentary I watched today suits my wishes . So I want to relate about it.

     

  It is about efforts made by some people to get a plant from one place and spread it to another places. During the 19^th century a missionary who was working in China sent a picture of a tree’s leaf with its flower to a botanist in Paris. They thought that the leaf looked like the fossil of an ancient tree they found in Europe . So the tree in China should be that tree that had  become extinct in Europe. The flowers when they bloom are white in colour and looks like butterflies or doves . So they called it the Dove Tree.

To find the tree an Englishman named Ernest Wilson was sent to China. Ernest was working in a botanical garden in Kew by then. But he went to China in 1899 by ship. With the hint given to him by some missionary Ernest finally located the tree though it was not an easy work. Life in China was harsh by then but he stayed three years doing researches, collecting plants and trees and taking photos. In 1902 he returned to England with some seeds of the Dove Tree.

      

But when they planted the seeds they wouldn’t sprout. When they cut the seeds in half they found out that the outer covering was very thick that it would take 3 years for the seedling to come out. But gradually they succeeded in getting some plants to grow.

The plants later spreaded to other European countries and even to North America where  one tree can be seen  in the compound of the White House now.

     

  Ernest even went back to China another 4 times to collect plants and trees . He brought back about 1000 plants and 1000 photos.

   

   In 1954 Chinese premier Chou En Lai attended a summit in Geneva, Switzerland. He saw the tree with it’s flowers and was impressed by it and asked what tree was it/ He was told it was Dove tree and that it came from China. So Chou, when arrived back in China gave directions to look for the trees, do research on them  and spread them to other parts of the country, which they did also with some difficulties.

     

I think my wish to introduce new trees comes from my observation of nature. My mind doesn’t let anything I see pass away easily. When I see something nice I will appreciate it and when I see the opposite I have to try hard to erase it from my mind. So when I see beautiful trees I come to like them and am greedy enough to bring them to my land.

to be continued……