I recall that during the Channel Tunnel construction Rodney Helliwell
undertook the relocation of ancient woodland soil and wrote up the results.
https://academic.oup.com/forestry/article/69/1/57/545885. No idea what
happened in the longer term and Rodney is sadly no longer with us.
Tim Moya
-----Original Message-----
From: uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info <uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info>
On Behalf Of Mark Mackworth-Praed
Sent: 09 February 2021 17:58
To: UK Tree Care <uktc@xxxxxx.tree-care.info>
Subject: RE: How long does an ancient woodland take to develop?
I think the '400 years' thesis may be a bit optimistic, possibly deriving
from the date of 1600 AD having been selected (in England at least) during
the C20 as the conventional date for assigning the AW categorisation to a
woodland - i.e. if there was evidence that it was a woodland at that date, it
could be considered 'ancient'. But there was an assumption underlying this,
which was that if a site was wooded in 1600, it was likely to have been
continuously wooded throughout historical times before that, and possibly
even back to the post-glacial period.
However, as we're continually discovering, landscape evolution is likely to
have been more complex than this - and also a historical factor often
forgotten was the reduction of the population of the British Isles in the mid
C14 by, it's thought, around one-third due to the Black Death, leading to
widespread abandonment of tracts of former agricultural land. On which, one
assumes, woodland was able to grow through natural succession subsequently.
And as Rod said, the cyclical management by humans (coppicing etc.) is/was
crucial to the development and survival of AW plant & invertebrate
communities - so it's not just a case of planting it and coming back 600,
800, or 1000 years later to see what it's doing.
'You can't rush evolution' - very true, unless of course you happen to be a
spiky sort of virus.
Mark M-P
-----Original Message-----
From: uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info <uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info>
On Behalf Of benjaminfuest758@xxxxxxxxxxx.com
Sent: 09 February 2021 15:23
To: UK Tree Care <uktc@xxxxxx.tree-care.info>
Subject: Re: How long does an ancient woodland take to develop?
Absolutely Jim. You can’t rush evolution.
Sent from my iPhone
On 9 Feb 2021, at 14:59, oldoaktree@xxxxxxxxx.net
<uktc@xxxxxx.tree-care.info> wrote:
Hi Jim,
Yes I remember you talking about that. They did the right thing to give up
if they wanted to be back home for tea. In 2150.
The woodland I have been talking about has been, in part, degraded by
conifer plantations but the FC, bless erm, have been putting it right by
replacing with broadleaf natives as of late.
Like you say, a woodland is only part trees, and I would gamble that under
the ground is more important than over it, as it is often seen when
plantations on ancient woodlands are often overtaken by the natural flora
because the soil and its massive array of co-conspirators can’t but help to
restore the 'ecological cathedral'. Good on 'erm.
Go easy
Dave
-----Original Message-----
From: uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info
<uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info> On Behalf Of Jim Quaife
Sent: 09 February 2021 14:33
To: UK Tree Care <uktc@xxxxxx.tree-care.info>
Subject: RE: How long does an ancient woodland take to develop?
I'm sure that I've posted this before but in the 70s the FC excavated a
cubic metre (literally a cube) from a sitka plantation to count the number
of organisms present, microscopic and otherwise. They gave up at a million.
AW is as much to do with the soil as trees and one cannot plant an AW, but
one can plant a woodland which has the potential to become one.
Jim
-----Original Message-----
From: uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info
[mailto:uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info] On Behalf Of
oldoaktree@xxxxxxxxx.net
Sent: 09 February 2021 13:16
To: UK Tree Care
Subject: RE: How long does an ancient woodland take to develop?
Thanks for all of your replies, illuminating and thought provoking.
I'm not in a position to say much on here, but as an Arb it is so sad to
see such wanton ignorance about these, to use a Chris Packham phrase,
'Ecological Cathedrals'.
I'm just reading Bill Bryson's A Short History of Everything which I
thoroughly recommend and the extent of what we don’t know is a real take
home factor from this very accessible book. Some of it is very funny too
which always goes down well with me!
Indulge me a quote on fungi "gather together all the fungi in a typical
hectare of meadowland and you will have 2800 kilogrammes of the stuff.
These are not marginal organisms. - Altogether, about 70 thousand species
have been identified but it is thought the total number could be as high as
1.8 million".
That book was wrote in 2003 so I wouldn't be surprised if those figures are
a lot higher now.
Cheers
Dave
-----Original Message-----
From: uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info
<uktc-request@xxxxxx.tree-care.info> On Behalf Of Jon Heuch
Sent: 09 February 2021 12:34
To: UK Tree Care <uktc@xxxxxx.tree-care.info>
Subject: Re: How long does an ancient woodland take to develop?
Dave
It's quite a challenge since it is a categorisation (I was told off once by
describing ASNW as a designation) so it cannot be recreated:
i) About 400 years
ii) You will need a time machine to enter the plot on some
ancient maps to make sure that each subsequent map shows the area to
be wooded
However, If you are asking how long will it take for a bare patch of
land to develop into woodland with some good ecological features of
course the best model is the Rothamsted fields that were left.
Wildnerness was the word adopted then; now we might used the term
re-wilding. They are very well documented
http://www.era.rothamsted.ac.uk/index.php?area=home
<http://www.era.rothamsted.ac.uk/index.php?area=home&page=index&datase
t=8> &page=index&dataset=8. They have been around for 140 years so you
may have a lot of reading to do to work out what sort of time frame you
want to consider.
Jon
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