Green corridor to link forests in tribute to late Queen

TWO of England’s largest woodlands will be connected for the first time as part of a new reforesting project in honour of the late Queen.

A 60-mile corridor of hedgerows and woodland will be cultivated from the Wyre Forest in the north to the Lower Wye Valley and Forest of Dean in the south as part of a legacy project of the Queen’s Green Canopy, a scheme that invited people to plant trees to mark Queen Elizabeth II’S Platinum Jubilee.

While Wyre Forest is the largest woodland Natural Nature Reserve in the country, the surrounding landscape has seen a decline in tree numbers owing to ash dieback and other causes.

To help wildlife to survive in the space between the two forests, trusts in Gloucestershire, Herefordshire and Worcestershire have teamed up to cultivate what they say will become “a wooded landscape at a scale never seen in the region before”.

Dr Juliet Hynes, Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust’s head of ecological evidence, said: “It will provide a fantastic opportunity for local communities, landowners and farmers to build a closer relationship with trees.

“Trees and hedgerows can help to tackle the impacts of climate change – providing livestock with shade in the summer, fruit and nuts for birds and small mammals in the winter and increased water infiltration.”

Much of the space between the forests is farmland. According to the Tree Council charity, planting hedges can help farmers by protecting soil from erosion, providing shelter for animals in winter, reducing deaths from exposure, and offering shade for livestock helping maintain milk yields and fertility.

The project will be paid for by Trees Call to Action, a fund developed by Defra with the Forestry Commission, and supported by Herefordshire, Worcestershire and Gloucestershire county councils and Severn Trent Water.