The Capon Oak Tree is one of the last surviving trees of the ancient Jedforest, close to Jedwater, the small river which has cut a dramatic course below soft sandstone cliffs.
It is located 2 miles (3.2 km) south of Jedburgh, Scotland, west of the A68. Nowadays the Capon Tree is held together with concrete, bricks and timber beams supporting its trunk and branches due to a massive split down the middle of the trunk. Despite its delicate nature it still continues to grow.
It has been the subject of some unusual artwork, including a construction which appeared for a while in its branches - an installation sculpture. Parking to view the tree is difficult, and you can't stop on the road passing it. Access is permitted although the land is private, since Scottish land law reforms now permit such access without the need for any right of way or express permission.
Trees are being replanted in the Borders to establish a renewal of the ancient 'Caledon Wood', or great northern forest, which included Ettrick Forest and Jedforest. The Borders Forest Trust maintains community woodlands and encourages the use of naturally harvested timber from woodland thinning or removal of trees at the end of their cycle. The Woodschool teaches apprentices to make top quality furniture from the ancient hardwoods, instead of seeing them cut up for firewood or to make garden woodchippings. Eoin Cox, a former partner in the Jedburgh Press small printing works, was awarded an MBE for his initiative in setting this up and encouraging the reforestation and improvement woodland management of the Borders region.
Famous quotes containing the words oak tree, oak and/or tree:
“Where he swings in the wind and rain,
In the sun and in the snow,
Without pleasure, without pain,
On the dead oak tree bough.”
—Edward Thomas (1878–1917)
“Alas for America as I must so often say, the ungirt, the diffuse, the profuse, procumbent, one wide ground juniper, out of which no cedar, no oak will rear up a mast to the clouds! It all runs to leaves, to suckers, to tendrils, to miscellany. The air is loaded with poppy, with imbecility, with dispersion, & sloth.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The tree the tempest with a crash of wood
Throws down in front of us is not to bar
Our passage to our journey’s end for good,
But just to ask us who we think we are....”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)