Features

‘Phil Archer’, the record-breaking actor, talks trees, Warwickshire and soap

Yorkshire schoolchildren are learning the Scandinavian way as Forest schools take root in Yorkshire

As the annual Autumn mushroom bonanza kicks into gear, we glance into the infinitely complex world of trees and toadstools

Many hedges may be under threat, but Molly Barnes discovers the ancient art of hedgelaying is alive and kicking in the Marches.

Wynn Brown puts a flagon of cider by the distant gatepost and walks back to his tools: “Something to aim for,” he explains with a grin. Then he jerks his chainsaw into action and turns menacingly towards his neighbour’s Herefordshire hedge.

For the first time in half a millennium, our woods are resounding to the snorts and grunts of wild boar – but what, wonders Kate Langrish, are the implications for forest owners? 

If you go down to the woods today you may be in for a surprise – a six-foot long, 200kg, tusked surprise to be more precise. Nobody knows just how many there are or exactly where they are living, but after centuries of absence, wild boar are once more roaming Britain’s woodlands.

A generation on from the Great Storm of 1987, Oliver Bullough finds there is much to cheer about the 100 mile-an-hour winds which devastated southern woodlands.

Caroline John chronicles the sterling efforts of a dedicated group of  Scottish islanders to reverse a devastating decline in tree cover

Life in the Jungle is Michael Heseltine’s absorbing account of a life in politics, beginning with his upbringing in South Wales and love of nature. From Shrewsbury public school he went to become president of the Oxford Union, dabbled with the property market and founded the Haymarket publishing empire. 

“British timber is out there growing but it is not getting to market. If these volumes were not coming across from Europe then all our British sawmills would have closed down.”

Environmental concerns mean green certification is now a requirement for most timber suppliers, but Oliver Bullough asks whether good intentions are destroying what is left of our native timber industry

“Despite providing virtually all our heat for thousands of years, wood as a fuel is in its infancy in Britain – somehow we see it as primitive and overlook its fantastic potential.”