The Forest of Numbers

When trees are marked with paint, usually a fluorescent cross, it means they are destined for felling. Yet these numbers were obviously painted for another purpose.

I soon discovered that the numbered trees are part of a scientific study to look at exchanges between trees and soils. In the interim, almost every other tree more than a few years old in this part of the forest has been felled. The numbered trees were spared for their ‘research value’ and have since taken on a new significance, a perverse reminder that we can count in two digits, the last remaining trees.

Heading South

Bramblings (Fringilla montifringilla) breed in the forests of Russia and Scandinavia. As from September, they migrate south in the millions in search of beech nuts.

Migrating birds have lots to contend with. Physical objects such as television and mobile phone transmission towers obstruct their flight. But more insidiously, the effects of climate change can alter birds’ delicate seasonal clocks.

Warming temperatures in many regions also change plant growth patterns, throwing biological cycles out of sync. Nothing operates in isolation. Climate change can disrupt relationships and the timing of critical life events.

Given the expected decline of European beech due to climate change-induced drying, beech trees are expected to disappear in these low-elevation forests.

What then will these birds eat?

745 Bäume

On 16 June 2017, a group of protestors who were protesting against the proposed A5–Westast Autobahn attached posters with the words ‘irreplaceable’ in French and German, to the 745 trees that will be felled should the project go ahead.

If you stop at just one of any of those 745 trees, gaze into it branches and recognize its worth, the enormity of the loss becomes apparent.

Yet some still struggle to comprehend the value of old trees, preferring lorries and concrete, noise and pollution and a fractured town.