Is there any truth in this saying with regards to how good the summer
is?

I noticed one oak tree close to me in East London is coming out in
leaf - whereas all the ash trees are bare.
Most horse chestnuts are out in leaf and the catkins on the planes
seem very large this year...

Comments anyone?

Methinks there maybe some logic in this saying.

From what I remember oaks are temperature sensitive when it come to leafing,
whereas the ash responds to daylight length. In warmer springs the oak will
leaf before the ash and the saying then predicts a dry summer. Remembering
what I read in one of Lamb's books, he said that 70% of the time weather
patterns will 'carry over' into the next season, hence a warm summer will
follow a warm spring. Now this definitely didn't happen last year!

I gather in these climate warmed years, the oak is nearly always leafing
before the ash (it certainly wasn't always so). This is having the effect in
woodlands of shading the ash by the oaks and they are now being 'out
competed'. An ashless future may await us.
________________
Nick G
Otter Valley, Devon
83 m amsl
http://www.ottervalley.co.uk

On Tue, 1 Apr 2008 02:20:25 -0700 (PDT), Scott W wrote:

Is there any truth in this saying with regards to how good the summer
is?

Not very. The Ash is always the last tree up here to burst into leaf, by
at least a week if not three... It's also one of the first to drop it's
leaves come autumn.

Only the very earliest signs of buds swelling on the trees around us,
still waiting for the Daffodils to flower. First lambs arrived yesterday,
poor beggers. It was very went and windy last night, not quite F8 but
gusting to upper 30's low 40's mph. Was 5C so windchill was only(ha!) down
to -10C...

--
Cheers
Dave.

"Scott W" wrote in message
...
Is there any truth in this saying with regards to how good the summer
is?

I noticed one oak tree close to me in East London is coming out in
leaf - whereas all the ash trees are bare.
Most horse chestnuts are out in leaf and the catkins on the planes
seem very large this year...

Comments anyone?

Here in East Staffordshire I have not seen Ash flowering first in the 40
plus years that I have lived here. The oaks in this area are always in leaf
weeks before Ash.

Derek

I

On Apr 1, 12:52*pm, "Derek Nicklin"
wrote:
"Scott W" wrote in message

...

Is there any truth in this saying with regards to how good the summer
is?

I noticed one oak tree close to me in East London is coming out in
leaf - whereas all the ash trees are bare.
Most horse chestnuts are out in leaf and the catkins on the planes
seem very large this year...

Comments anyone?

Here in East Staffordshire I have not seen Ash flowering first in the 40
plus years that I have lived here. The oaks in this area are always in leaf
weeks before Ash.

Derek

I

Isn't the phrase "Oak before ash, there'll be a splash; ash before
oak, there'll be a soak. In which case, there's a reasonable amount of
truth in it. On a world scale, British summers are pretty
wet....unless you live in the far SE, of course!