I recall seeing an ivy covered, swan necked, cast iron column with a T/E Beta 5 when I use to do a paper round. It was dayburning, but because of the ivy, the council couldn't gain access to the control box. Eventually the ivy was removed as one of the residents burnt some of it off, probably as it was affecting their nearby wall.

The column has probably been replaced now.

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From streetlighting to radio, dance through the night whilst the streetlights are glowing outside.

This one, although is isn't as ridiculous as the other ones on this page, shouldn't be removed due to the fact that it adds to the environmental green space that the council is obsessed with!

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Take my dog's fleas.
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Seeing this thread has just reminded me that I still have this picture of an ivy-covered GEC Z8896 on a concrete column in Birchington-on-Sea in Kent that I took 5 years ago. Sadly the column has now been replaced with a totally characterless and ivy-less Mini Iridium, but it was a lovely sight while it lasted!

I've also got this pic of an SGS203 on a 1967 S&L column which has a tree growing up its shaft on London Road in Romford, Havering. This is still surviving in 2013, but has escaped replacement by a whisker, as the rest of the road has had its lanterns swapped for Airtraces. The SGS203 is just behind the camera in the Streetview. As you can see, the tree has now covered the entire shaft (including the bracket joint) so it looks as if the SGS203 is installed on a bracket attached to a tree!  



That's actually a Philips XGS103!

There is this in Horsham, West Sussex. Everytime I do see this particular column I just look in wonder on how a tree has 'arranged' itself on concrete.

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From streetlighting to radio, dance through the night whilst the streetlights are glowing outside.

I can't recall any ivy covered street lighting columns up this way but there are lots of overhead electricity supply poles many of which support street lighting which are clad with ivy. It is usually allowed to grow up to the point of the first wire where like nearby trees it is pruned on a yearly basis. One particular example is clad with Russian vine which goes a brilliant red colour in Autumn.

It's probably the same as we have on our garage wall, as that goes a firery red colour in autumn before the leaves drop off. With overhead supply poles, especially if the wires are not insulated, I suspect it'd pose a bit of a hazard if any plants were left to actually touch the conductors.

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Just been trawling through my old photos in the SABRE gallery and found a better view of the Z8896 I mentioned in my last post, as well as another ivy column just down the road from this, a GEC Z8831 (which as you can see from the dayburning is the mercury version of the Z8832, later known as the SRL8). A view of the ivy around the column base can be seen here.

There is one concrete column just bordering Forge Valley near where I live, it was missed out with the concrete column replacement scheme (the ones that were previously on the road were 10 concrete columns with a bridge bracket and  GEC Z9530Ms for the lamps. Also was 1 concrete 'pole' column with GEC Z5698U as the lamp.

I do not know the specific type of this one, so any help would be appreciated.

Not as 'Ivied' as you would see in the above pictures, but you can see how the Ivy is slowly releasing his vengeance.