25/06/2016
this 800-year-old oak has been removed from bracknall although less than 80 years ago it stood a founding tree of Windsor Great Park. (51°25'12.7"N 0°44'14.7"W).
The park was for many centuries, the private hunting ground of Windsor Castle, dating primarily from the mid-13th century.
This ancient oak stood in part of the park that covered an area many times the size known today as Windsor Forest
The Tree stood only 2.6 mi east of East Hampstead Park, a favored royal hunting lodge in the Windsor great park of henry the VIII’s. at this point in time this oak was already circa 300 years old.
sadly, this tree died off through unknown causes 2 years ago.
due to its proximity to many houses and a road it had to be sectionaly dismantled by our friends Calibra Tree Surgeons ( https://www.facebook.com/calibra.treesurgeons ) with the use of a Crain lorry (see Photos) and brought to us in a RBM grab truck ( https://www.facebook.com/rbmhaulage ).
It’s at this point our work starts and nothing about this job has been straight forward,
mainly because the main butt alone weighed 7 tons, not even large farm machinery provided by our friend Thomas Edwards at Severndale farm could pick it up hole sail.
even our large swing blade sawmill couldn’t get above it without being chocked up 500mm off the ground after it being put to its highest settings so resourceful as ever used logs under one set of legs and a trailer the other (see photos).
with milling you regularly find pieces of metal in trees and the older it is and closer to people the more likely this is, this tree was no exception. we hit metal near the surface ruining the first blade of three which may well have been were a house name sign was nailed to it but there were also large blue marks (a sign of metal) deep in the tree, using the rings to age these foreign objects they could be up to 500 years old. Could it be one of henry the VIII’s arrow tips... Unlikely, but a nice thought, it is however worth remembering that at this point in time the woodland was not a public area but solely for royal hunting.
After milling near half of the tree in one day we flipped the tree over and milled down from the other side, leaving a four-inch slab 7 foot at one point in one direction and eleven foot in the other, this priceless piece of timber will be used to make a table of truly epic proportions once it has dried naturally over four years. The rest of the timber, mainly cut to two and a half inches by ten at eleven-foot-long for making table tops, and some at 2 inches thick for other furniture will all be photographed and put up for sale over the next few days at wye valley timber ( https://www.facebook.com/wyevalleytimber ).
