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Fools & Dreamers is a 30-minute documentary telling the story of Hinewai Nature Reserve, on Canterbury’s Banks Peninsula, and its kaitiaki/manager of 30 years, botanist Hugh Wilson. We learn about the commitment of Hugh and the Maurice White Native Forest Trust to regenerate marginal, hilly farmland into native forest, using a minimal interference method that allows nature to do the work, giving life to over 1500 hectares of native forest, waterways, and the creatures that live within them. When, in 1987, Hugh let the local community know about his plans to allow gorse to grow as a nurse canopy for self-sown native trees, the response was sceptical at best and outright angry and disparaging for the most part – one farmer stating the plan was the sort to be expected only of “fools and dreamers”. Now considered a local hero by town and country folk alike, Hugh’s home at Hinewai overlooks a valley resplendent in native forest canopy, where birds and other wildlife are abundant and 47 known waterfalls are in permanent flow. An inspiring, charismatic personality, Hugh’s passion and enthusiasm for his life’s project come through in every sentence he speaks. A dreamer who has made his dream come true, Hugh has proven without doubt that nature knows best – and that he is no fool.
Watch the full film now! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VZSJ... Find out more about Hinewai Reserve ** http://hinewai.org.nz More about Happen Films ** Support us in making more films: https://happenfilms.com/donate Website: https://happenfilms.com Twitter: https://twitter.com/happenfilms Instagram: https://instagram.com/happenfilms Facebook: https://facebook.com/happenfilms Trees are one element in the fight against climate change.
So what would happen if everyone in the world planted a tree? Made by Maia Films, 26 February 2020 If the UK is serious about offsetting its carbon dioxide emissions, it must plant tens of millions of trees from imported species on open land. John Healey, professor of forest sciences at Bangor University, says that relying on indigenous species such as oak and beech will make it impossible for the government to hit its climate goals. We will have no choice but to engage with the commercial sector in large-scale planting of imported conifers, despite fears of the impact on habitats and wildlife.
1,420 hectares of woodland were planted in England in the year to March 2019, against the government’s target of 5,000 hectares. Wales and Northern Ireland planted 520 hectares and 240 hectares respectively. Not mentioned was the fact that Scotland planted 11,200 hectares – well exceeding the current annual target of 10,000 hectares, and five times the total of the rest of the UK. I wonder why that would be? Scotland plants 22 million trees to tackle climate crisis while England falls 7 million short of target The number of trees planted in Scotland now represents 84% of the UK total, with 8% of the population. Humans have wiped out 60% of animals since 1970 - Zoological Society of London The cause? Trees are disappearing from the face of the Earth at an alarming rate. And humans are going extinct with them. This is because forests are home to 80% of the world’s biodiversity. When the forests go… so do the animals. And things aren’t looking good. In just the past decade, the situation has gotten even worse as United Nations scientists discover terrifying facts…
But the real cause goes much deeper. People just aren’t doing their part. 105 new trees from Woodland Trust: Oak, Hazel, Rowan, Hawthorn and Blackthorn.
Potted 15 oak at the allotment on 9 March Potted 15 rowans at the allotment on 22 March (plus 4 Scots Pines rescued from Dundreggan compost heap) Potted 15 silver birch and 15 hazel at the allotment on 23 March Potted 30 hawthorn and 15 blackthorn at the allotment on 24 March Running the entire width of one floor at London’s Hayward gallery is a six-screen video which depicts, at about life size, a spruce tree swaying in the breeze in Finland. To accommodate its scale, the tree is projected horizontally, and at its foot stands the artist Eija-Liisa Ahtila, in a blue parka, dwarfed by the spreading conifer. The six projected sections of the tree tremble and sway out of sync with one another, adding to a growing sense of majestic befuddlement. You can’t take it in all at once, any more than you could if you stood before the real thing. Distantly, I hear the branches soughing and faint birdsong. Titled Horizontal – Vaakasuora, it makes you look and look some more.Horizontal – Vaakasuora is one of the highlights of Among the Trees, an exhibition that fills the Hayward with a knotty tangle of romanticism, wood carving and trunk splitting, fake trees and real trees, doomed trees and casts of trees, dead trees, trees that never lived and trees that have survived for thousands of years. Pascale Marthine Tayou’s tree bears a blossom of colourful plastic bags which rustle in the draft from the gallery’s air conditioning, while Simryn Gill’s photographs of mangroves in the Straits of Malacca focus on the plastic detritus, lost fishing gear and clothing that festoon the branches in a horrible bunting on the edge of one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes.
This website provides information on tree nurseries in Scotland. The emphasis is on local native tree nurseries, although some larger ones which guarantee known tree seed provenance have been included.
It aims to enable buyers to find good, if possible local, sources of tree seeds & seedlings for planting, in order: (a) to encourage small and local tree nurseries providing employment in rural areas in Scotland and (b) to encourage the use of trees from the right local provenance in planting schemes For local native tree nurseries, see here NB. We also have separate lists of fruit tree and horticultural nurseries in Scotland For fruit trees, see here. For Horticultural Tree Nurseries in Scotland, see here. I recommend Trees for Life, Dundreggan Lodge, Glen Moriston, Inverness, Highlands IV63 7YJ Telephone: 01320 340242 E: [email protected] W: treesforlife.org.uk/work/tree-nursery/ Planting new trees is not a difficult job, but one to get right.
The most important considerations are root health, weather, soil conditions and aftercare. Use only native trees: Scots pine, birch (downy and silver), alder, oak (pedunculate and sessile), ash, hazel, willow, rowan, aspen, wych elm, hawthorn, holly, juniper, elder and wild cherry. Planting is best done between October and April. I use a strimmer to cut grass back before digging a hole. They often advise planting 2m apart - I usually do it 5m apart, randomised to look natural. Dig a deeper hole than you need, and break up the soil to allow air in. Choose a tree suited to the amount of soil moisture. Square planting holes aid root penetration at the corners on heavy soils. I usually add water to give them a good start. Don't plant too deep - root plug about 2cm below ground level, the collar mark where it started to grow above ground level with the ground. Ensure roots are pointing down, eliminate air pockets around them, and heel in (secure but not compacted). Ensure the tree is planted straight upright. I usually finish off by turning the turf removed upside down round the tree to restrict weed growth. Use a stake and protective cover (against deer and rabbits). Inspect (annually) for weeds choking growth, damage to stakes, tree tie too tight, vandalism etc. “For me, trees have always been the most penetrating preachers. I revere them when they live in tribes and families, in forests and groves. And even more I revere them when they stand alone. They are like lonely persons. Not like hermits who have stolen away out of some weakness, but like great, solitary men, like Beethoven and Nietzsche. In their highest boughs the world rustles, their roots rest in infinity; but they do not lose themselves there, they struggle with all the force of their lives for one thing only: to fulfil themselves according to their own laws, to build up their own form, to represent themselves. Nothing is holier, nothing is more exemplary than a beautiful, strong tree. When a tree is cut down and reveals its naked death-wound to the sun, one can read its whole history in the luminous, inscribed disk of its trunk: in the rings of its years, its scars, all the struggle, all the suffering, all the sickness, all the happiness and prosperity stand truly written, the narrow years and the luxurious years, the attacks withstood, the storms endured. And every young farmboy knows that the hardest and noblest wood has the narrowest rings, that high on the mountains and in continuing danger the most indestructible, the strongest, the ideal trees grow.
Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They do not preach learning and precepts, they preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life. A tree says: A kernel is hidden in me, a spark, a thought, I am life from eternal life. The attempt and the risk that the eternal mother took with me is unique, unique the form and veins of my skin, unique the smallest play of leaves in my branches and the smallest scar on my bark. I was made to form and reveal the eternal in my smallest special detail. A tree says: My strength is trust. I know nothing about my fathers, I know nothing about the thousand children that every year spring out of me. I live out the secret of my seed to the very end, and I care for nothing else. I trust that God is in me. I trust that my labor is holy. Out of this trust I live. When we are stricken and cannot bear our lives any longer, then a tree has something to say to us: Be still! Be still! Look at me! Life is not easy, life is not difficult. Those are childish thoughts. Let God speak within you, and your thoughts will grow silent. You are anxious because your path leads away from mother and home. But every step and every day lead you back again to the mother. Home is neither here nor there. Home is within you, or home is nowhere at all. A longing to wander tears my heart when I hear trees rustling in the wind at evening. If one listens to them silently for a long time, this longing reveals its kernel, its meaning. It is not so much a matter of escaping from one's suffering, though it may seem to be so. It is a longing for home, for a memory of the mother, for new metaphors for life. It leads home. Every path leads homeward, every step is birth, every step is death, every grave is mother. So the tree rustles in the evening, when we stand uneasy before our own childish thoughts: Trees have long thoughts, long-breathing and restful, just as they have longer lives than ours. They are wiser than we are, as long as we do not listen to them. But when we have learned how to listen to trees, then the brevity and the quickness and the childlike hastiness of our thoughts achieve an incomparable joy. Whoever has learned how to listen to trees no longer wants to be a tree. He wants to be nothing except what he is. That is home. That is happiness." Climate targets seem sensible, but are actually impeding effective action. Let’s do something completely different.
The crisis is not imminent. The crisis is here. The recent infernos in Australia, the storms and floods in Brazil, Madagascar, Spain and the US, the economic collapse in Somalia, caused in part by a devastating cycle of droughts and floods, are not, or not only, a vision of the future. They are signs of a current and escalating catastrophe. This is why several governments and parliaments, the UK Parliament among them, have declared a climate emergency. But no one in government acts as if it is real. They operate within the old world of incremental planning for a disaster that has yet to arrive. A spokesman for Forestry and Land Scotland, said: “Renewable energy and forests are key to Scotland’s contribution to mitigating climate change and FLS is successfully managing both elements.
“The figure for trees felled for windfarm development on Scotland’s forests and land, as managed by FLS, over the past 20 years is 13.9 million. However, it should be noted that these trees – being a commercial crop – will have eventually have been felled and passed into the timber supply chain in any case.” They added: “That figure for felled trees should also be contrasted with that for the number of trees planted in Scotland over the years 2000 - 2019, a total of 272,000,000, and renewable energy developments fit well with this. “To date, the amount of woodland removed across Scotland’s national forests and land, managed by FLS, for windfarm development is not even one per cent of the total woodland area.” |
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