- Annotated Journal, Part I -Pond Hopping: Exploring British Agriculture

1. Getting to Britain.

Monday, May 16, 2016

Travelling to the United Kingdom is not simple task. I should know: I just experienced that firsthand! Now, the boarding and airport security are standard; nothing went awry. But good God, the duration of our flight: transcontinental flights are not my thing – physiologically. This is largely as a result of my inability to sleep while travelling in moving vehicles, be they on terra firma or in the upper reaches of the stratosphere. It’s a good thing I love travelling then. Besides the one physiological hiccup, both flights – first, the flight from Chicago O’Hare International to Dublin airports, followed by the connecting flight from Dublin to London Heathrow International Airport – were fantastic.

2. Arriving in Britain.

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

I am making the best of the first day in our trip, exploring (and admiring) Hyde Park. While unfortunately unable to locate the royal park’s multi-hectare rose garden, the well-landscaped grounds more than made up for that conundrum. Thinking ahead, I look forward tomorrow to travelling through Devon and Wiltshire and visiting North Wyke Research and Stonehenge.

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Fig. 1. Kensington Palace, a royal palace and the official London residence of Their Royal Highnesses The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and their children, His Royal Highness The Prince Henry of Wales, and several cousins. The state rooms, once the home of Queen Victoria, now encompass a museum and are open to the public. The royals occupying the palace live in the upper, less ornate floors.

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Fig. 2. The adjoining gardens to the Kensington Palace estate. This particular portion of the garden is an excellent example of a Victorian era sunken garden.

Fig. 3. A closer look at the prior photograph. The predominate species are a combination of Agapanthus ssp. and tulips.

Fig 4. A group of mute swans on The Serpentine – a manmade lake within the geographic center of Hyde Park. Fun fact: several centuries back, swans were nearly extirpated from the British Isles due to overhunting. During the reign of Henry VIII, a proclamation was issued that made all wild swans property of the reigning monarch. As a result, the mute swan population rebounded. This edict, which has the effect of law, still applies today, making all mute swans rightful property of Her Majesty The Queen.

3. Sustainable Agriculture and Stone Ruins.

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Fig. 5. The private residence and gardens of Hyde Park’s warden. (Being that Hyde Park is a royal park, it receives a warden as its head of operations, rather than a superintendent.)

Fig. 6. Hyde Park’s Italian garden. (Inspired by Italy, yes, but strictly Georgian in all of its neoclassicism.)

Fig. 7. A lovely fountain at the end of the Italian garden, spilling over into The Serpentine.

Wednesday, May 18, 2016

It’s been a long day to say the least – but a great one without a doubt! (Via bus, the Pond Hopping group drove from Greater London west into the ancient English county of Devon, and from there headed back east to our hotel accommodations in the City of Westminster. On the return voyage, however, we stopped at Stonehenge for several hours, in the English county of Wiltshire.) I found the current research and other programs underway at North Wyke Research to be absolutely fascinating, despite my professional interest being ecologically sustainable fruit and vegetable production – not sustainable cattle and sheep grazing. I found the deputy head of site to be passionate and insightful on the subject of sustainability within agriculture. The water catchment device located within the sheep pasture was especially intriguing. And while seeing Stonehenge was not as exciting as North Wyke (at least to me – I’m usually the odd bird though), it was still wonderful seeing spectacular feats of engineering thousands of years old. I found the various theories for why the ruins were constructed in the first place to be stimulating as well. Speaking of theories, while my gut tells me that the ruins were simply a multipurpose religious site that also functioned as a solar calendar, being an agroecologist and not an archeologist, I am not qualified nor knowledgeable to give an opinion on the matter.

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Fig. 1. Nestled in the heart of Devon’s rolling landscape, North Wyke Research specializes in sustainable grazing systems. In the distance is Exmoor National Park.

Fig. 2. Before becoming a research institution, North Wycke – the manor house pictured left – was the home of the Wycke family, a regionally powerful family that held a barony. The last Wycke died childless in 1948, and bequeathed the property to the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (or “BBSRC,” a non-departmental government body), which opened the site for research purposes in 1952.

4. Agronomic Research at Rothamsted.

Thursday, May 19, 2016

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Fig. 3. Some lovely Friesian x Hereford cows at North Wyke Research, with calves.

Fig. 4. World-renown, UNESCO-protected Stonehenge, in all of its mystic glory.

Fig. 5. Thanks to the UK’s common land laws, people have a right to walk through designated portions of private property. As an example of said laws, here I am getting a photograph of this mixed breed cow, in the midst of its pasture, just a few hundred meters from Stonehenge.

It was a beautiful day to visit Rothamsted Research. While I enjoyed the entire tour of the institute and its facilities, I particularly enjoyed observing the institute’s long-term research on wheat production systems, the Broadbalk Experiment, which is on-site. The fact that this valuable research continues – in spite of funding instability – is astounding. If only the United States had agricultural research stations as renown or respected as Rothamsted – which is widely believed to be the oldest agricultural research station in the world still operating.

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Fig. 1. Amongst other things, Rothamsted Research plays host to The National Willow Collection. A germplasm repository, the collection provides Rothamsted scientists the opportunity to study carbon sequestration in willow.

Fig. 2. Rothamsted Research is named after Rothamsted Manor, pictured left. Sir John Bennet Lawes, the institution’s founder, bequeathed his family’s mansion and surrounding estate to Rothamsted Research upon his death in 1900.

5. The National Fruit Collection at Brogdale.

Friday, May 20, 2016

On our last-minute free day in London, I had the opportunity to travel to Faversham, Kent (in East Anglia). In Faversham, I visited the British National Fruit Collection, likely the largest germplasm repository of temperate fruits anywhere in the world. Of particular interest to me was the large ensemble of apple and pears on-site. Many of the cultivars present represent centuries – if not millennia – of horticultural history. Since my pass to the collection is valid for one year, I look forward to returning to Brogdale soon – someway, somehow.

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Fig. 3. The Broadbalk Experiment, Rothamsted’s famous “classical experiment” on winter wheat, was first sown in October of 1843. The experiment, which studies the effects of various nitrogen applications – both naturally occurring and manmade – continues to this day.

Fig. 4. A mature English oak, just south of the Broadbalk Experiment.

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Fig. 1. A domesticated, ornamental strain of Siever’s crabapple (Malus sieversii). Widely used in breeding programs.

Fig. 2. Lilac? Nope. This is a cultivar of Japanese cherry.

Fig. 3. A walk through the site’s large and diverse apple collection.

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Fig. 4. Two rows of now commercially extinct ‘Beauty of Bath’ apples: a very early-ripening cultivar from Kent.

Fig. 5. The menagerie of currants and gooseberries located on-site.

Fig. 6. The National Fruit Collection is initiating a study that will observe the effects climate change has on apple tree health and yield. Within each of nine cloches are nine apple cultivars; the nine cloches will be divided into three populations to apply three different scenarios predicted by climatologists in the year 2075. This study has the potential to reveal the future of fruit production worldwide, and has the support of Her Majesty’s Government.

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Fig 7. A closer look inside an example cloche.

Fig. 8. A specimen of Mespilus germanica, or medlar.

Fig. 9. A specimen of quince, Cydonia oblonga var. ‘Van Deeman’.

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Fig. 10. A look to the north of the pears on-site. Most originate prior to 1800.

Fig. 11. A specimen of Malus domestica ‘Kuldzhinka Krupnoplodnaya’. This red-fleshed Ukrainian apple is immune to both apple scab and fire blight, and is therefore of much potential to no-spray growers or apple breeders.

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Fig. 12. The 66-cultivar collection of alcoholic cider apples on-site.

Fig. 13. An example of espalier, whereby trees are trained against a wall or hedge into two dimensions.

6. Chester: Journey and Sightseeing.

Saturday, May 21, 2016

We finally left London today. (My apologies to the reader, but large cities are not my cup of tea.) The train ride was pleasant, albeit congested due to our luggage issue – no worries. Anyway, it was a pleasure to arrive at Chester and walk through a city of such historical significance, whether it be through its Tudor architecture, Roman amphitheater, fortified ramparts, or its role

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Fig. 14. The National Fruit Collection’s commercial plantation of sweet cherries.

Fig. 15. A brief glance at the largest collection of Damson, European, Japanese, Mirabelle, and interspecific plums in the world.

in the English Civil War. In spite of the slight drizzle, it was a lovely afternoon. Include the dinner held in the house of a local family, and it all became an excellent day.

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Fig. 1. The very beautiful Chester Cathedral – first built in 1050 CE!

Fig. 2. Admiring the masonry used to construct this masterpiece.

7. A Day in Liverpool.

Sunday, May 22, 2016

It was a wet morning to start of our day – and mildly cold: not surprised. Rather than travel under the River Mersey by train, the Pond Hopping group decided to ride across on a ferry, which was worthwhile. As a result of the generous precipitation, myself and a core group of friends toured the well-appointed (in terms of artifacts) and informative Merseyside Maritime Museum, along with a tour of the inspiring (Anglican) Cathedral Church of Christ in Liverpool thereafter lunch. With skies clearing in the afternoon, our fist Sunday in the United Kingdom was an excellent one.

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Fig. 3. The four archangels, according to Catholic and Anglican tradition. Pictured from left to right are Saint Michael, Saint Gabriel, Saint Raphael, and Saint Uriel.

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Fig. 1. Rather than take the train, we elected to take this fun-loving ferry to Liverpool.

Fig. 2. Heading to Liverpool over the River Mersey.

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Fig. 3. The Cathedral Church of Christ in Liverpool (Anglican), is the largest cathedral in the British Isles, and the third-largest church in Europe.