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Warwickshire's oldest trees
(article published in ‘Warwickshire Wildlife’ Spring 2004, magazine
of the Warwickshire Wildlife Trust)
Intro
Did you know there are more ancient trees in Britain than any other
country in Western Europe, and the Warwickshire area can boast some
impressive war veterans (of the English Civil War!).
Regular listeners of Radio 4’s Nature programme will be aware of the
Ancient Tree Hunt, which is currently attempting to establish a
database of all ancient trees in the British Isles. The Hunt is
being organised by The Woodland Trust, the Ancient Tree Forum and
the Tree Register of the British Isles.
All shapes and sizes
The traditional image of an ancient tree in Britain is a stag-horned
oak with a hollow trunk, or a massive yew in a churchyard. But
whilst Warwickshire has its fair share of old oaks, beeches and
chestnuts (e.g. at Stoneleigh Deer Park, Coombe Countryside Park and
Charlecote – some at least 400 years old), we have other veterans
that are less obvious but possibly much older.
In Piles Coppice just east of Coventry, huge coppice stools throw up
as many as a dozen trunks about 2ft in diameter. The trunks are
relatively young but the rootstocks could well exceed a thousand
years in age. Indeed the Small-leaved Lime-Sessile Oak tree
community here may represent a rare remnant of the original
‘wildwood’ cover that formed after the last ice age some 8000 years
ago. And what is so reassuring is that the limes remain full of
vigour, happily sprouting up from windblown root-plates and laying
down new roots where branches meet the ground.
Near Welford-on-Avon, a group of Black Poplars has behaved similarly
– massive, mis-shapen trees perhaps representing 200-300 years of
growth sprouting from rootstocks of even older trees that have
collapsed, and young growth sprouting skywards from prostrate trunks
and limbs. Some of our riverside willows also attained large girths
and must be 300-400 years old, and regular pollarding has extended
their life by preventing them from becoming top-heavy (one of the
greatest threats to such trees).
Why are ancient trees so important?
Such trees often contribute enormously to the local character of an
area and can represent important landmarks, e.g. the Bagington Oak
near Coventry Airport, the Crowley’s Oak in Ullenhall, or the
ancient trees in our deer parks, stately homes and churchyards. They
are part of the historic landscape, the natural equivalent of
ancient monuments, and they can help us to understand historic
landscapes and land-uses. Warwickshire’s veterans were even being
noted as long ago as 1826 when Jacob Strutt’s Sylva Brittanica
included accounts of the Bull Oak in Warwick’s Wedgenock Park and
the Gospel Oak of Stoneleigh (the latter was a parish boundary
tree).
But they are also important for the other plants and animals that
they support. An impressive array of micro-habitats can be present
on one old tree alone, including heart-rotted wood, water-filled rot
holes, sap runs, old beetle holes, crevices under bark, partially
rotten roots, attached dead limbs, bracket fungi and mosses and of
course, the foliage itself. Several hundred of Britain’s rarest and
most spectacular insects and fungi are specifically associated with
very old trees, and their conservation is intrinsically linked to
that of the trees.
Special insects of old trees locally include a range of beetles,
including the attractive red and black Ampedus click beetles; also
some spectacular hoverflies like Pocota, which is a very convincing
bumblebee mimic. Birds such as owls, jackdaws and stock doves
particularly like hollow trunks for nesting.
But you may be surprised to know that with a few exceptions, local
woods are not the best places to find these trees, even ancient
woods. Traditional woodlands management has tended to clear them,
and they do not compete well when shaded out. Check out those old
deer parks, ancient hedgerows, water-courses and suburban greenspace
– you may be surprised at what has survived in some remote corner.
The 1999 Warwickshire’s Oldest Tree Survey initiated by Warwickshire
Museum went some way to listing our oldest trees but response was
patchy and we know there are other veterans out there. So if you
know of any trees you reckon to be 300 years or more old, or with
girths exceeding 300 inches, please contact the author.
Steven Falk, Warwickshire Museum
If you know of other ancient trees in Warwickshire we’d love to hear from you! Please email us, providing as
much information as possible and preferably including an Ordnance
Survey map reference.
We’re also very keen to build up a library of photographs of ancient trees
and ancient tree sites. Can you help? If you’re willing to share your
treescapes and tree portraits, please
email them
to us, remembering to provide location details for each photo, with an
Ordnance Survey map reference if possible. We’d love to include them in a
future article! |
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