philosophy

As a child I was brought up on a tenant farm on the edge of a large estate. One of my first memories is of thousands of elm trees dying of dutch elm disease and watching timber companies come in to fell these very large dead and dangerous trees.

One of the problems at the time that because so many trees died the timber became worthless and therefore the land owner had to pay the timber companies to fell and take the trees away. This resulted in the land owners being reluctant to replant the trees for fear of future cost. I was disappointed to find out that dutch elm disease was brought into this country from america by importing cheap american elm timber.

From a very young age I could see that if we did not manage sustainable woodland the long term damage to our environment was inevitable. Instances such as dutch elm disease and the damage to trees in the hurricanes of '87 and '89 may be avoided with some care and planning.

I use this philosophy to manage trees within parks, gardens, churchyards, streets, hedgerow, and woodland trees.