Source: BBC

Will the saplings we plant during National Tree Week’s 40th anniversary grow to have such amazing stories to tell as these magnificent specimens?

Trees have had a tough time during the last 100 years.

Only by nurturing the seed of enthusiasm year after year will we be able to cultivate a lasting environmental legacy in our parks, streets, woods and green spaces

First came Dutch elm disease in the 1920s, a fungal pathogen that killed tens of millions of elm trees in Britain, spread by beetles it continues to be a serious threat. Fast forward to today and another fungus is on the verge of causing mass destruction among another of our tree species. This time the tree under threat is ash and the pathogen is ash dieback.

“Ash dieback has shown us what can happen to one species and will change our landscape just as much as Dutch elm disease did,” says Pauline Buchanan Black, director general of The Tree Council.

It has the potential to cause significant damage to the population and may now already be too late to prevent. But there is something we can all do to try and offset these losses to our landscapes and neighbourhoods and that’s plant a tree.

And The Tree Council are hoping as many of us as possible take part in this year’s annual National Tree Week. It was inaugurated in 1975, explains Ms Buchanan Black, to “make Britain more tree-conscious, encourage tree planting and value non-forest stock” after Dutch elm disease had irrevocably changed the landscape.

Now with forty years of successful growth behind it, she says, “National Tree Week has become firmly rooted in the calendar and its anniversary will give communities and tree planters everywhere plenty to celebrate.”

This year National Tree Week runs from 28 Nov to 6 Dec, when thousands of people are encouraged to plant millions of trees. “But only by nurturing the seed of enthusiasm year after year will we be able to cultivate a lasting environmental legacy in our parks, streets, woods and green spaces,” Ms Buchanan Black tells BBC Earth.

Whomping willows

To highlight this year’s tree-planting event we have taken inspiration from The Tree Council’s Tree of the Month (#TreeOfTheMonth) series to showcase some truly stunning British trees, each with their own story to tell.

We hope this awareness of how trees tell the stories of our heritage and culture will help slow down the rate of loss, but we still need to plant the ancient trees of the future

“With the Magna Carta anniversary and the celebrations around the Ankerwyke Yew earlier this year, more people know what an important part trees have played in history.

“We hope this awareness of how trees tell the stories of our heritage and culture will help slow down the rate of loss, but we still need to plant the ancient trees of the future,” says Ms Buchanan Black.

Much Marcle yew, Herefordshire (credit: The Tree Council)

The Much Marcle yew can be found in a churchyard in Herefordshire; it has a girth of over 9m at 1.4m from the ground. It is reported to have been planted around the year 500, making it over 1,500 years old. The classic hollow shape of an ancient tree like this is made by sulphur polypore, also known as sulphur shelf, a fungus that rots the heartwood.

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