Would you believe, it's found another way of getting at me?

When I retired, I put a lot of thought into what would be my leaving gift, and decided on a tree. Books which people had given had been got rid of after a number of years according to some modern theory about children not liking books older than a few years. A nice chunk of crystal (me being known for my interest in geology) - I had heard of one school where the head had had a collection, where the collection had been buried in the grounds. But we had trees that had been given in memory of children that had grown and flourished. It would be a rowan, which I knew would grow in the local soil, and I did a poster of a tree, with its variant names and folklore about it, until I could get it.

I had to wait a little, because the chosen spot had been treated a few years before to get rid of Japanese Knotweed, but the time passed, and I donated a bred variety of the tree, which the caretaker put in before I could make sure of the way it was done. He watered it regularly, but the next spring, it was clearly dead.

I researched again, and bought a native type, and gave strict instructions that I was going to put proper compost in the hole, and Rootgrow to hep it get established. The caretaker put it in again, and I had to burrow around it to add the fungus stuff. It, too, failed to leaf after the winter, and was then broken off and the support somehow removed and lost.

I got a very cheap whip from the London Wildlife Trust last year, and installed it in a hole lined with a cardboard box, filled woth bought in topsoil, and treated its roots with Rootgrow again. Before Easter, it had leaves and flowers at the top of the stem. Hooray.

I went in on Friday, and couldn't see it. All the leaves and buds had been stripped off, and it had been pulled up. Fortunately the roots seemed OK, so I have brought it home and potted it up, with more Rootgrow, and hope that it will be able to recover. But I am terribly hurt that the attitude of the school seems to be that children are like that, what can you expect? I don't think it was the children who threw away the support this time, or disposed of the fence I put round it.