The Ecological Basis of the Management of Woodland Nature Reserves in Great Britain

Abstract

flora and fauna and for the establishment of National Nature Reserves. The natural vegetation over much of Great Britain is woodland; the landscape became forest dominated after the retreat of the ice sheet. Pollen records have shown that at first birch predominated, later pine superseded the birch and eventually the pine was replaced by mixed hardwood forests largely dominated by oak but with alder, elm and birch frequent. Wide-scale and continued deforestation began in Great Britain about 2000 B.C. during the mixed hardwood stage and culminated in the ruthless felling of woodland during the last two world wars when home-grown timber was used as much as possible to save shipping space. There seems little doubt that much of Great Britain would be tree covered still, if man had not become so efficient at forest clearance. Mainly as a result of man's activities less than 6% of the land surface is now under trees and much of the woodland that remains consists of poor scrubby growth, a result of centuries of use. Comparatively recently, successive governments have encouraged forestry by means of grants and tax relief concessions and the trend to complete deforestation was halted in the last quarter of a century. New woodlands have been established both by private landowners and the Forestry Commission, who have converted many of the so-called devastated woodlands to commercial forests and planted trees on land cleared of timber centuries ago. The new woodlands consist in the main of even-aged, monoculture plantations of softwood trees, usually of alien species. The extensive planting of fast-growing, exotic conifers was dictated by the poor quality of the land available to forestry, the need to build up a timber reserve quickly and the wood requirements of industry, 90% of which