Ash dieback has infected many of the woodlands on the Salisbury Plain Training Area, affecting approximately 14,000 trees. To protect the future of uninfected ash trees, the Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO), together with its strategic partner, Landmarc Support Services (Landmarc), has begun carrying out a tree-felling clearance scheme to remove infected trees. Carolyne Locher visited the site to report on this complex operation.
THE Ministry of Defence (MoD) announced, in January, the felling of thousands of ash trees infected with dieback on Salisbury Plain Training Area (SPTA). They are targeting trees that present a significant health and safety risk: alongside roads and public rights of way, and within woodlands used for military training. Ashdown Copse, a 130 ha woodland used for dry training, will be the first site cleared.
When I visit in mid February, works are well underway. The site is spartan in places, chaotic in others. Relentless rain, thick grey chalky mud and piles of brash render some compartments passable only by machine. Where cleared, the landscape is spiked with seemingly desolate or fractured stems, reminiscent of scenes from the aftermath of Australia’s wildfires. While signs did warn of unexploded ordnance, this ‘scorched earth’ look is temporary.
As of 1 April 2019, the MoD owned, or held rights over, 431,300 ha of the UK’s land and foreshore, with ranges and training areas occupying 83 per cent of this area. At 38,040 ha, equivalent to the size of the Isle of Wight, Salisbury Plain Training Area is the MoD’s largest military training area, hosting large-scale troop and armoured vehicle training which cannot be accommodated elsewhere. Last year, 1,000,000 service personnel (UK Army, UK Army Reserves and cadets, and NATO allied forces) participated in dry training, live firing, armoured vehicle, artillery, engineering, infantry and aircraft manoeuvres throughout SPTA.
The MoD’s training estate includes 18,000 ha (2018 figures) of woodland cover, with “somewhere between 3 and 3.5 million ash trees”, estimates Jez Kalkowski, the Defence Infrastructure Organisation’s (DIO) senior forester. “It is impossible to give a figure with any real accuracy, but it does illustrate the impact this disease will have in a lot of areas.”
Ash dieback (ADB) was first identified in the UK in 2012. In 2013, the disease was confirmed on MoD properties in north East Anglia and at Cinque Ports Training Area in Kent, in woods badly damaged during the 1987 storms. “Post-storm natural regeneration was mostly ash and, at the time, positively encouraged.”
In 2017, surveys of Cinque Ports’ high-risk tree zones (roadsides, footpaths, adjacent to buildings and training features) revealed the disease was well established. Surveys of the woods used by the military revealed the same.
“We knew we had to do some felling,” says Jez. “What surprised us was the speed at which the disease had spread, going from small pockets of trees looking a bit ropey to vast tracts of whole-scale infection, dead and dangerous trees actually falling apart.” 2017’s hot, dry summer may have sped things up.
“In a woodland environment, young to semi-mature small-diameter trees (40–50 years old) with ADB tend to die quickly. If a mature tree is a bit croaky, other pathogens present (honey fungus or other) finish them off. In the landscape, mature ash could hang on for years, but the hazard of their becoming fragile is too much of a risk. While we do not want to take down healthy trees, we have to make sure works are commercially viable and it costs significantly more to fell a tree that is falling apart.”
Landmarc Support Services has worked across the military training estate for over 15 years, providing a range of management and support services. Landmarc’s forester Judith Peachey oversees the harvesting and marketing of all MoD timber and instructs all management works.
Ash clearance at Cinque Ports began in 2018 with the removal of 270 high-risk roadside (and overhanging) trees. The 2019 works programme cleared ash across 12 ha of SSSi woodland. Monitoring the remaining 20 ha of woodland during the summer will inform works for the autumn, alongside the reinstatement (followed by restocking) of the 12 ha. Some locations remain out of bounds to military training. They will reopen once the ash is cleared and the woodlands are deemed safe.
On Salisbury Plain, ADB was first identified during a spring survey three years ago. Working on leaf cover, (approximately) 14,000 trees with 30–40 per cent crown dieback were identified throughout woodlands and copses across the plain.
Ashdown Copse was “a typical mixed woodland: good stands of Douglas fir and pine next to broadleaf stands (mixed age and species and part-ASNW), 60 to 70 per cent ash interspersed with oak, beech and hazel growing on chalky soils,” says Judith. Between summer 2018 and summer 2019, ADB spread at an alarming rate.
“By last summer, virtually all ash was infected. Some retained leaves in the crown (not a true reflection of how infected a tree can be) but most was standing deadwood.”
Landmarc works closely with the DIO when planning any works. “The DIO talk with landowners, tenants and the general public. Landmarc deals with the operational side. We held a stakeholder meeting in Tidworth for farming and sporting tenants and the parish councils, introducing our site surveys and assessments, the works we would do, where and how, year-on-year, the works will be carried out, and an ongoing schedule of surveying.”
Landmarc instructed the tender. Euroforest won the standing sale. Mark Hedley, area manager for Euroforest (accompanied by Inverness University intern Catherine) says that Euroforest bought 9,000 tonnes of (mostly ash) timber: 20 per cent (understorey and tops) for woodfuel biomass, 40 per cent for higher-quality local hardwood chip, 20 per cent firewood logs and 20 per cent hardwood sawlogs.
THE PROGRAMME BEGINS
Ashdown Copse’s works programme runs in three phases, employing three mechanical harvesting teams, two hand-cutters, a chipper (contracted per day) and endless haulage, to remove 80 per cent of the ash before bird-nesting season begins at the end of March.
Judith has never managed such a complex site, with more than one subcontractor working for the main contractor.
“There is lots going on,” she says. “From Cinque Ports, we learned to use mechanical harvesting where possible. Trees showing 50 per cent leaf in the crown were completely rotten at the base; others were so brittle they shattered when felled.
“Every tree is completely different internally, making it difficult to decide when risk-assessing how to fell them”.
In Phase 1, “a small shear on an excavator takes out the hazel coppice understorey,” explains Mark. Chris Hall of RVC Forestry drives the Hyundai 235 excavator with JAK tree shear. “Chris’s work makes the site safer, reducing blocks so there is better visibility and the next team can get around, adding value when we come to fell the larger trees.
“Ideally, you would retain the understorey and hazel, but with so much ash to remove, it would get damaged in the felling operation. Removing the hazel, we can get a return for it and it can begin to regenerate. Hazel, smaller ash, brash and lop-and-top is chipped onsite and used for biomass.”
‘Exercise Wessex Storm’, a training exercise involving around 4,000 troops, is in full swing on the west side of the plain. Large, low, exploding booms echo though the worksite. As first machine in the woods, Chris says: “I was told I might find artillery shells or foxholes where troops had dug themselves in.”
In Phase 2, Neil Packwood of L&P Forestry removes all stems that fit through his Viking 650.3 harvesting head powered by an Ecolog 560D. He paints oversized stems with a pink band of paint, for removal during Phase 3.
L&P Forestry most recently subcontracted on a Landmarc-instructed site, clearing pine at Lulworth tank ranges.
Judith says: “We still deliver a works programme, mostly conifer thinnings, alongside these clearances. A lot is planned for the next 24 months. As soon as we finish here, we are planning for the next.”
In Phase 3, mature oversized ash trees are prepared for manual felling by Nick Mills of Nick Mills Forestry. Woodcracker C550 trees shears (Westtech head) on a 10-metre-reach grab arm, powered by a Robex 300 LC-9A 30-tonne excavator, remove top and side branches to prevent shedding from the crown.
Judith says, “If we can fell with the shears, we will. Otherwise, a chainsaw operator works in conjunction with the shears to bring the trees down safely.”
Euroforest’s compliance team risk assesses each tree prior to felling to establish the safest methodology.
Chainsaw operator George Ashby removes the toes of an ash, 3 feet in diameter at the base, and cuts back the stem to where the timber is solid. George says, “The trees are unpredictable. They could be sound at the base and rotten at 12 foot. You don’t know until you put the saw into them. The sawlog buyer will select what they want and the rest goes through the chipper.”
The chipper works on contract, filling one artic lorry after the other, anything between eight and 15 loads per visit. All haulage, arrivals and departures “are coordinated, one way in from the tank crossing on the Tidworth Road and one way out,” says forwarder operator Dave Lister of L&P Forestry, and Euroforest’s site safety coordinator.
In addition to haulage coordination, Dave ensures the integrity of the welfare unit, which Landmarc encourages all contractors to supply for their teams. He makes sure that all management happens safely, that all compartments worked are well away from another machine’s risk zone and that barriers remain across all site entrances. “If soldiers come in, I call Judith who calls the military to move them on,” Dave says.
Returning to his forwarder cab, Dave drives carefully up the rutted track to the loading bay and fills the first of three timber wagons parked up.
A slash of blue below the gunmetal horizon is just visible through the crowns of the woodland edge. This steep bank is low risk, unused by the military or the public, so the trees will be left.
REGENERATION
Ashdown Copse will be surveyed during the summer, gauging how much infection remains. Dave says: “This woodland was left to its own devices for decades. While that was good for conservation, having to take things right back to the start gives us a chance to regenerate the woodland, creating the right structure for military training and re-establishing an attractive landscape feature for public use.”
The rat-tat-tat of machine-gun fire echoes across these clearings. On a flat site, the biggest issue is often that rain cannot soak away fast enough. “The volume of timber and biomass coming out makes the sides of the road really wet and muddy,” says Dave. “The track, unsurprisingly awful, will be reinstated to military standards.
“In the compartments, we hope to install temporary deer fencing and to replant in December (weather pending) with broadleaves grown from seeds sourced in the UK (small-leaved lime, hazel, hornbeam and oak). We will incorporate areas for the military to park their vehicles in, for installing Landmarc-supplied portaloos and areas where trainees can put up their bivvies. Planting shrub species (field maple, thorns and hazel) will further enrich the ridesides.”
Ashdown Copse’s clearance represents 30 per cent of the total work on Salisbury Plain and Judith is pleased with progress.
“We have a lot to do in a relatively short time,” she says. “We have done a lot of the work. I will be happier when we do the clear-up and see the results of the reinstatement.”
Remote copses and outlying woods used for military training are currently being assessed and Judith is working on tenders to remove 850 ash trees along a 7-km stretch of the A345. Works are licensed and approved through Forestry Commission England.
“The next phase of works has been assessed and is in process with Forestry England to get felling licences,” says Judith. “The tenders go out next month, then we will start planning again for September.”
Planning includes booking road closures (night works). Long lead-in times allow the council to advise businesses based at Solstice Park, who use the A345 as a transport link to the A303 or M4, of the emergency works and the diversions to be put in place.
Across the wider MoD estate, ash clearance is now underway at Stanford Training Area (Thetford, Norfolk) and Sennybridge (Wales). “SPTA is 9–12 months behind Cinque Ports, the North is approximately 12 months behind SPTA. Next year, across the six regions we manage, we have a full harvesting programme (conifer) with at least one operation in each.
“Concurrently, we will have a large programme of ash works through Catterick, and in woodlands and along roads other than in Scotland.”
Storm Ciara and Storm Dennis reminded DIO forester Jez Kalkowski of the urgency. He says, “In Wensleydale, I saw ash trees shedding the small branches that died last year. Next year, it will be shedding of larger branches. In nearly 30 years as a forester, I have seen iconic trees in the landscape and forests succumb to many diseases: ADB, Phytophthora, AOD, all manner of beasties not dying out in winter. . .” He pauses. “Things are changing. The lesson is to think outside the box; not only replanting with natives indicative of a time 5,000 years ago and hardly applicable now (in some areas). Trees are living, dynamic organisms. Be imaginative about resilience and diversity, involve more species diversity in what is thought of as ‘the right tree’ when it comes to planting ‘the right tree in the right place’. The only way to find out whether other species will work is to plant them. We may not know for 50 years, but we have to start somewhere.”
The MoD prefers that their timber bring a commercial return, but it is not the primary driver. This offers the freedom to experiment. “At SPTA, road closures along the A345, mechanical felling, the price paid for chip – it is an expensive operation.
“We have accepted that it will cost us. In Cumbria, we have a remote wood (site of special scientific interest) full of young and mature infected ash trees. It is a live-firing impact area, so no one goes in there. For us, it is a control zone to be left alone. There is an element of oak and sycamore and pioneer species, and the ash trees can fall apart and create habitats in their own right without intervention. It will be interesting to see what species start to takeover.”
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