Llanymynech

August 2009 – Tim Hills: From Bye-gones 1871: ‘There are two yew trees in Llanymynech Church Yard, which are hollow, but they exhibit a green old age, doubtless gaining nourishment from the earth up their shells. One is situate near the National School, and it measures round the butt, immediately springing from the earth, 12 feet. The soil I do not think is very favourable to the development of the tree, and a wall cramps it on the west side, and it is annually shorn of its boughs for Christmas decorations. The other tree faces south, and has suffered from the same treatment. This tree measures 16 feet around its base. The elders say that these trees have ‘been neither smaller nor larger these forty years’. While there are two yews in the churchyard, neither are in the right position or size to be the trees described here.