Call of wild brightens up an otherwise grey day

In the darkening evening, I passed a skeletal wood in which the only tree that still wore its crown was a solitary Scots Pine; how it found its way there, amidst beeches and sycamores, I couldn’t guess.

Scots Pine was one of the ancient trees of Ireland, a pioneer tree, possibly of Iberian strain. It forested vast areas after the Ice Age until a warming climate drove it into decline 4,000 years ago, ending in the extinction of the Irish population some 2,000 years later. The trees we see now have their antecedents in seedlings imported from Scotland in 1700AD.

The evening was silent but for my footsteps crunching the occasional mussel or cockle shell dropped by grey crows. Through the dark maze of branches, the pink scrawls of a weak sun could be seen across the clouds.