Would you like a free tree sapling?

Half a million tree saplings are having to be destroyed because of delays in government tree planting subsidies, and we in Extinction Rebellion Lewisham are going to save as many as we can find homes for. Please fill in this form and we’ll order you an oak sapling for you to collect from a location in Lewisham Borough in November, free of charge! And share this form widely! https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfEiziuDZmasO5iov0tU6x6K3ZWPYbP7zoRFQeh-vr8eqKUXQ/viewform

Thanks for sharing this here, Jamie.

A link to some media coverage of this sad situation:

I hope lots of Lewisham residents take up this offer and rescue these trees

And I hope they plant them in appropriate places, where they can reach their full potential. Oak isn’t a tree for a small town garden. We had a mature oak boundary tree at the bottom of our last garden, which was wonderful. But the garden was huge, as was the space the other side of our boundary.

One oak tree needs 30 cubic metres of soil space for its roots. We just had things like bluebells, celandine and sweet woodruff (although that last was a pain!) plus a bench in that part of the garden. As this piece from Barcham makes clear, you can’t entomb trees in hard landscaping. I’m not saying this to put people off - just to say be fair to the tree and think long term …

https://www.barcham.co.uk/blog/how-much-space-do-i-need-for-a-tree/

I wonder where the nursery collected the 800,000 acorns the newspaper refers to. Pigs eat acorns - they get turned loose in the New Forest to do so, because acorns are poisonous to ponies. I used to love watching the squirrels racing around ours.

Edit to add: Having now read the full Times piece, I see that the nursery owner who’s threatening to burn them says

“But nursery owners say demand has failed to materialise as many landowners are delaying planting because they think that new subsidies due in 2024 will be more lucrative than those currently on offer.”

Hmmm who are these landowners, I wonder?

It’s a really interesting point for discussion.

The potential loss of half a million trees sounds like an environmental tragedy. But it’s worthwhile remembering that many trees themselves are a commercial crop. Specialist growers producing saplings aren’t likely to be scraping the forest floor and the pigs will continue to eat their fill of acorns. Growers will be producing acorns for seedlings much in the manner that any horticultural company produces seeds for future crops.

The tragedy isn’t so much the destruction of half a million saplings. But the loss of income to these growers. And of course the loss of new trees and their positive contribution to carbon sequestration (say that 10x fast). In the short term, I would sincerely hope that any saplings need destroying will be burned for either local heat or power generation (such as for greenhouses) or divert to food for livestock.

There is perhaps another conversation on the role of government policy in this matter. But perhaps that is best left for another forum to discuss.

But I hear your concerns about where they are planted. Forest Hill’s streetscape benefits from many beautiful trees. But many are unsuitable for their locations particularly because of the type of roots sytem. I’ve also been to many country and garden shows in the last few years where I’ve seen thousands of saplings given away to families. I’ve no doubt many of these were tossed in the days following… or poorly located if planted.

And well done to ER for creating an opportunity for Lewisham residents out of this.

Please do not plant an oak tree ( or any large woodland/forest tree like ash, sycamore, eucalyptus) in a small London garden, you may feel better about yourself that you have done a good thing for the environment but the owner of your house and their neighbours in 50 years time will have to bear the consequences.
If you have a large garden in Dulwich village or a park, please plant as many as you can.
You could also sponsor a tree/s in the national forest or many other woodlands around the country or maybe try to work with lewisham council or Greenwich park to try to find a suitable area to plant some of our national trees which need the space to growing their full majestic beauty.
Instead why not plant something more suitable in your garden, any fruit trees on dwarf rootstocks, rowan, crab apple, hawthorn; the list goes on.
Trees are wonderful and you should plant as many as you can during your lifetime but please plant the m in the appropriate place.

@Jamie - have you considered reaching out to Friends of Mayow Park, Friends of Blythe Hill Fields (@Tim_Part?) or perhaps Glendale directly?

I know Mayow Park has lost a few big trees in storms over the last few years, and as others have expressed, many people here will not have the space for an Oak tree - but the parks might be able to take a few and look after them through to maturity.

Thanks for the suggestions, I’ve just emailed them all