A SHORT stretch of the bank of the River Tees in Flatts Wood, near Barnard Castle, has been identified as temperate rainforest.
The area, only about 100 yards in length, was discovered by dale botanist and orchid expert, Dr Richard Warren, several years ago.
Sheltered by a steep bank, the area is characterised by extensive moss, fern and ivy growth. Even in deep-midwinter it is a lush green.
Dr Warren said: “It is what’s growing rather than what the climate is [that makes it a rainforest]. It is the high humidity in which the mosses thrive, and the lack of pollution. During the summer this will be rich with plants
“There is a lovely little grotto and there are orchids growing in there and globe flowers.”
The botanist has extensive experience of rainforests having studied plants in places like the Amazon and Papua New Guinea.
He said: “There is a tendency nowadays where people want to clear out rough bits of woodland so they are more accessible for people walking, but of course if you do that in places like this they dry out, you lose the humidity and you lose the rainforest situation.
“Not only that but you get people walking and there is a trampling factor, which is damaging as well.
“The important thing is not to lose the bits we’ve got in the interests hikers.”
“It is a haven [for wildlife] and it is a habitat that is self-sustaining. It is rich and it is something you don’t want to interfere with.
“It is small but that makes it all the more vulnerable and valuable.”
Dr Warren believes much of the banks of the River Tees would have been temperate rainforest in earlier times, but it has been lost to forestry and tree felling.
However, of Flatts Wood he said: “In my opinion it is very well maintained.”
According to a new book by Guy Shrubsole, the Lost Rainforests of Britain, as much as a fifth of the country was once rainforest.
Mr Shrubsole’s website lostrainforestsofbritain.org aims to map all the remaining fragments of rainforest in the country and campaigns for their preservation and growth.
