The treescape of the Lake District is of huge importance visually, culturally and ecologically. It is considered a hotspot for ancient trees, which are particularly valuable for birds, insects, mosses and lichens.
Our wonderful trees and woodlands deliver a range of benefits including incomes and jobs, helping maintain our valuable land based industries; they provide forest and woodland products, support wildlife, help manage water flow, store carbon, inspire visits and exploration, help improve people’s health and wellbeing and are part of our cultural heritage.
Woodland and forestry currently cover 13% of the National Park area, particularly in the highly wooded landscape of its south eastern area. Broadleaved trees makes up 64% of woodlands and forestry, the remainder being coniferous. We are pleased to know from the State of the Park Report 2018 that there has been no loss of semi-natural ancient woodland, and that 75% of woodlands and forests are in active management.
Cumbria Woodlands Director, Neville Elstone thinks that “it is a time of great opportunity and challenge for woodlands. On one hand so many people including Government are increasingly seeing the value and need for more and better woodlands; and on the other the threat posed by both climate change and diseases such as ash die back.”
The Government’s 25 Year Environment Plan and recently published England Trees Action Plan 2021-2024 have created a momentum of change for how trees and woodland are valued and what role they can play in meeting the challenges we face in the National Park. The decisions partners, land owners, farmers and foresters make about how land is managed will make the greatest impact on achieving the Partnership’s shared ambitions for farming, nature and climate recovery. There is a strong, unifying connection between each of these.
Whilst developing our Plan with partners and communities we learned that we must all work together through farming and forestry to encourage trees, woodlands and scrub to become a greater part of the landscape to help it adapt to climate change. We believe we can store more carbon and become more resilient to its potential impact.
To help achieve this, the Partnership’s ambition for 2050, is that woodland cover will have increased from 13% to 17% of the park. This equates to an average annual increase of 209 hectares each year. During a 30 year period, each year’s worth of planting will store 59,356 tonnes of CO2. That is a lot of carbon we can remove from the atmosphere for only 4% increase, when a tree is planted in the right place, for the right reason.
The expertise and experience of the Cumbria and Lakes Trees Woodlands and Forestry Group have contributed to the development of the Plan and these ideas. You can read more about how a range of other partners, farmers and land managers have also supported the plan for farming, nature and climate in other blogs.
Now is your opportunity to get involved, share your ideas about more trees and woodlands and tell us what you think about our plans.
