THE saying about mighty oaks growing from little acorns has been around for centuries… and now two visitors from Scotland have shown the principle extends to other species of tree, even when a long journey is involved.
After enjoying their first visit to the Island a couple of years earlier, Stuart and June Glassbrook returned in September 2015 to mark their ruby wedding.
St Helier’s Royal Square was one of the venues the couple visited and, as it was conker season, they decided to take a few keepsakes that had dropped from the horse chestnut trees that are a feature of the square.
“We’d first come to Jersey after going to lots of Scottish islands, and a few times we’d gone home with a small stone or a pebble from the beach, so we picked up seven conkers as souvenirs of the trip,” Mr Glassbrook said.
One might imagine said conkers would then have gathered dust on the mantelpiece of the Glassbrooks’ home in Livingston, near Edinburgh, but instead they dug out a hand trowel and planted them in the garden – nothing ventured, and all that…
Almost a decade on, the couple returned to Jersey this month, with their fifth visit coming just weeks ahead of their golden wedding anniversary, and shared an update about their experiment.
The Scottish soil clearly has suited the conker from the opposite end of the British Isles, and over ten years the seed has sprouted and grown into a tree that’s around three metres high.
“We put a plaque on it and get lots of queries from people who see it and ask us about ‘the Jersey tree’ – it’s become part of our lives,” Mr Glassbrook said.
“Some people warn me that it’ll grow enormous, but I’ve made sure to cut it back regularly, and by the time it gets really big, I probably won’t be around.”
The young tree has yet to produce its own conkers; Mrs Glassbrook said that when it does, they might bring some across on a future visit to Jersey – perhaps for their diamond wedding in 2036.
Having spent a week on the Island this time round, staying at the Pomme d’Or hotel, Mr and Mrs Glassbrook will mark 50 years of marriage on 13 September back in Scotland, when they intend to return to the church where they were married and celebrate their golden wedding with friends and their family, including two children and eight grandchildren.
Historic horse chestnuts
- The saying “mighty oaks from little acorns grow” appears in the Geoffrey Chaucer poem Troilus and Criseyde, published in the 14th century.
- Horse chestnuts, (Aesculus hippocastanum in Latin), have been known to grow for up to 300 years.
- The trees in the Royal Square in St Helier are believed to have been planted in the 1890s.
- It is often claimed that conkers can be used to ward off spiders, but there is no scientific evidence for this.
