Newly-created woodlands home to threatened wildlife

Turtle doves and cuckoos are among the threatened wildlife which have made their home in some of the 1,000 woods created in recent years by Britain’s Woodland Trust, the organisation said yesterday.

The trust said more than 12 million trees had been planted since the 1970s to create 26,205 acres of woodland across the UK – an area bigger than all the lakes in the Lake District put together.

From scouts taking a boat to the island of Eilean Shona to plant trees to Swedish army troop carriers used at Glen Devon – as well as two “virtual woods” created on the Archers on BBC Radio 4 – more than three million people have helped achieve the milestone of 1,000 new woodlands.

But more native forests are needed to help people and wildlife and the organisation is calling for 20 million trees a year to be planted over the next 50 years.

The trust also warned that no ground would be gained if new woodland was planted but action was not taken to protect what was already growing – with some 372 ancient woodlands currently at risk from a variety of threats such as golf courses and gravel extraction.

Surveys of woodland planted in recent years have turned up a roll call of wildlife, including a number of species which are under threat or have seen numbers decline nationally, including song thrushes, skylarks, green woodpeckers and snipes.

At one site in the Kentish High Weald, Comfort’s Wood, turtle doves, linnets, bullfinches, cuckoos and dunnocks are all thought to be breeding just 15 years after the trees were planted. The wood is also home to declining species of butterfly such as the small copper, common blue and small heath.

Among the 1,000 woods created with the help of the Woodland Trust are urban woods in Hull, the UK’s least wooded city, and woodland in Daventry to screen an industrial estate from the local community.

Victory Wood, near Canterbury, was planted to mark the bicentenary of the Battle of Trafalgar and has reconnected two pieces of ancient woodland, and at Heartwood Forest, near St Albans, Hertfordshire, the Woodland Trust’s plans to create England’s largest new native woodland are under way.

Woodland Trust president, TV personality Clive Anderson, said: “The simple act of planting trees unleashes a host of benefits: in just 12 years they become beautiful woodland, home to a vast array of wildlife and places where children can play, adults reflect, birds and plant life flourish and communities come together.

“They lock up carbon, are a natural defence against flooding, provide shelter from the elements and offer a sustainable supply of eco-friendly fuel.”

And he said: “We realise that 20 million trees is a huge task but an increase in tree-planting rates is essential and we can’t do it alone. That’s why the Trust is calling on all individuals and organisations to help rise to the challenge.”