Altamont is a tree lover’s paradise

FOR centuries, many of the owners of estates and large gardens in this country were compulsive and competitive collectors of exotic trees. Many of these collections still survive. I have a passionate interest in trees and for somebody like me, visiting one of these collections for the first time is an exciting event.

It happened the other day when I paid my first visit to Altamont House and gardens on the banks of the River Slaney in Co Carlow. The house is no longer lived in and the gardens were left to the State in the will of the late Corona North and are now very well cared for by the Office of Public Works.

The first thing to catch my eye was a fine Brewer spruce. This tree is a rarity in the wild, being confined to two or three mountain tops on the California/Oregon border. It first arrived in Europe in 1897 and is still not commonly planted. I can’t think why, because it’s quite spectacular. My Collins Tree Guide has rather a good description: “…the many slender branches lugubriously hung with black foliage like curtains of Spanish moss”.