It is also close to the woods known as the Colonel's woods.
Here stands a huge sweet chestnut. It really has to be seen up close to appreciate its longevity. Unfortunately there may be a bit of barbed wire to negotiate but I assure you it is worth it.
This huge tree "Castanea sativa" is the only European species of chestnut.
Normally chestnuts achieve a diameter of 2 metres, but this giant's girth approaches 6 metres.
Pollen analysis indicates that the sweet chestnut is not native to Great Britain, but is instead an "archaeophyte," a plant introduced by man, perhaps the Romans, before the year 1500.
Sweet Chestnut is widely grown for its edible nuts which when raw
are somewhat astringent, but when cooked are quite sweet.
The Foresters note ( slightly edited ) from July 25th.
What a cracking cache location. A place, and a tree, which most of us otherwise would never discover.
I reckon this lovely old-timer was planted within three or four years of 1675. Noseying around as I do in such places, I found another contemporary of this one, about 160 metres to the EastSouEast. That old stem, which is a beech not a chestnut, appears to have finally died about a hundred years ago and appears to have been planted around the mid-1670s too.
This tree would quite certainly have been seen by Bonnie Prince Charlie during what was probably the happiest time of his life. Returning to Scotland from Derby after his faintly ridiculous and typically vain attempt to be accepted by the English as their king, he would have come North up the road off which this little lane runs. From what is now the A872, as he approached his destination of Bannockburn House, he must have looked across to his right to see the first visible sight of that estate: these magnificent trees which form the Southern end of the Bannockburn House Wood.
If you were sitting on one of this tree's boughs in December 1774 you'd have seen the Poseur "Prince" at the head of his entourage of Catholic dreamers as they approached the estate. The stumps of those lower boughs are still there, still alive. A remarkable direct connection between us today and a significant figure in Scotland's history.
Charles was the houseguest of Sir Hugh Paterson, but that doesn't seem to have inhibited Charlie from giving his host's wife Clementine some attention. After giving the English a good hiding at the Battle of Falkirk in January 1745 he returned to Bannockburn House to continue his amours with Clementine. She later deserted the unfortunate Sir Hugh and followed her Beau to France where she bore Charles's daughter Charlotte some years later.