AN environmental group dedicated to improving Teesdale’s tree cover is looking for new areas to plant saplings.
Trees For Teesdale is changing tack for the coming season, shifting its focus from planting hedges or individual trees, to forming wildlife havens by creating new copses.
Volunteers are appealing for farmers and landowners who have a corner of a field to spare to get in touch.
Geoff King, of Trees For Teesdale, said the group has already secured 1,400 native species from the Woodland Trust and OVO Energy to begin planting in November.
Last year the group was fortunate that Barnard Castle resident Andrew Buck not only offered up a fenced off part of a field for the creation of a copse, but also made a donation towards the cost of the trees.
Among the species planted were beech, birch, cherry, oak, rowan and hazel. The beech trees were planted to form a hedge along one side of the field.
Mr King said: “We don’t think the beech have survived this awful dry summer so we might have to replant some of them.
“This is the sort of site we are looking for. We want to move away from labour intensive planting of single trees in cages, to this sort of copse in the corner of a field that can be fenced off. This piece of land was fenced off anyway, but we have put our own fences in other places.”
He added that trees are planted randomly between six and ten feet apart and it takes about ten years for the copse to begin to mature.
Mr King said: “Some of the trees [we have had sponsored] are spoken for because we have a project with the kids from Barney School, but we are looking for more sites for the 900 to 1,000 trees left, and we have a willing band of volunteers to plant them.”
Anyone who has land where they would like a copse planted can email Mr King at info@treesforteesdale.org.uk, or visit treesforteesdale.org.uk for more information.
