County Council offers free trees to landowners

Shropshire County Council is to help landowners to conserve and replace the county’s hedgerows by offering them free trees.

Trees and hedges are a traditional part of the UK landscape and havens for wildlife. Yet, of an estimated 1.8 million hedgerow trees, nearly a third are over a century old and may disappear from the landscape at any time over the next 50 years.

Most of the open countryside field trees would also originally have grown in a hedgerow and have survived the loss of their hedge. Without an immediate effort to establish new hedge and field trees, there will be profound changes to the UK landscape and its biodiversity.

In some cases roadside trees have to be removed due to road safety considerations. Trees which are on the grass verge can be easily replaced by the council. However, it is trying to work co-operatively with landowners to find ways, such as this scheme, to replace others.

John Everall, Shropshire County Council’s Cabinet member for sustainability, said: "We are proposing to tackle this problem head on via a community tree scheme, get trees to landowners, get them planted into fields and hedgerows, and make sure they survive until well established.

“In order for them to survive it is extremely important to highlight the new trees to cutting contractors, so that they are not cut with the existing hedgerow.”

Northern Shropshire is leading the way nationally on this issue. A visit by leading Defra officials is due to take place soon on a farm near Criftins after David Bevan, a local farmer, gave a presentation at a national conference to address the loss of hedgerow trees from the British countryside.

Shaun Burkey, Shropshire County Council’s conservation and community officer, said: “Over the past couple of years the Northern Shropshire Tree Warden scheme has also been negotiating with landowners to tag hedgerow trees, placing a small blue or red tag on a suitable sapling to save it from the hedge cutter.

“This has had some success, but to compliment this effort the council would like to offer landowners free trees to gap-up small sections of hedge using a mix of native hedge species and larger trees such as an oak or ash.

"It is important to give these young trees a chance to reach maturity; if not then large parts of the British landscape will look bleak and treeless within a generation or two."

Anyone wanting to participate in this campaign or get advice on tree planting should contact either John Blessington on (01743) 252569 or Shaun Burkey on (01691) 624448.

Additional information

The community tree scheme is kindly being sponsored by Maelor Nurseries, near Bronington, with funding coming from Shropshire's highways section, and from Leader+ and the project Parish Environmental Action - helping people shape the future of where they live.

Applications open immediately with the majority of deliveries planned for National Tree Week (21 November to 2 December).

13 November 2007