Where have all the Welsh trees come from?

[SR71]

Venturing into OO9, like many, thanks to Bachmann's Quarry Hunslets I've been looking at old reference pictures of places I know. Think Welsh narrow gauge and you think of trains clinging onto the side of lush tree lined valleys. But the early pictures show something different.

 

 

Tan-Y-Bwlch here has no trees. But now is surrounded by them

 

 

Similarly Beddgelert then and now. The slate mines I've been in are mostly self supporting or quarries (not mines) so were they using all the trees or was it a later thing? Was it that they were cleared during WWI and with the establishment of the forestry commission?

 

[TheQ]

Fenced off areas the sheep can no longer reach on the hill sides, they eat small saplings as they sprout.

Lack of maintenance inside the railway property, where old time linesmen had the job of keeping the undergrowth down to prevent fires.

[Jeremy Cumberland]

A lot of them are plantations. Here's a view of Tan y Bwlch that more or less matches your first picture. It's taken in the winter, which makes it clear that the hillside is covered in non-native conifers:

 

[LBRJ]

It isn't just Wales, it appears to be ever more  common all over the place.

 

There seems to be an idea afoot that letting trees grow here there and everywhere is somehow always a good thing and is "how nature intended" things to be.

A lot of the rural/urban fringe around me in the Pennine foothills is turning into a forest - I have been reliably told that that is how most of Britain should look....

The problem is that most of the trees are sycamores, which are not a native tree and will grow everywhere.

[rodent279]

Wasn't large areas of forest removed to build Elizabeth's navy? And I guess later on a lot of forest was used for pit props.

[Paul H Vigor]

1 hour ago, LBRJ said:

It isn't just Wales, it appears to be ever more  common all over the place.

 

There seems to be an idea afoot that letting trees grow here there and everywhere is somehow always a good thing and is "how nature intended" things to be.

A lot of the rural/urban fringe around me in the Pennine foothills is turning into a forest - I have been reliably told that that is how most of Britain should look....

The problem is that most of the trees are sycamores, which are not a native tree and will grow everywhere.

Much of what people consider regenerating woodland is in fact little more than scrubland. It amuses me to see planted community woods with saplings that will grow into huge, mature trees planted in formal rows, too close together!

[Wickham Green too]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

... the hillside is covered in non-native conifers:

Yep .............. contrary to thread title, them trees ain't Welsh !

[Jeremy Cumberland]

1 hour ago, rodent279 said:

Wasn't large areas of forest removed to build Elizabeth's navy? And I guess later on a lot of forest was used for pit props.

Not just Elizabeth's. Wooden shipbuilding was probably at its peak in the early nineteenth century, as we fought Napoleon, and the British Empire was at its peak, but before iron ships became common.

 

The slate and metal mines of North Wales didn't need much in the way of pit props. which are more associated with coal mining.

[Steamport Southport]

I think it's more a case of how quickly nature takes over when people (and animals) look the other way.

 

I remember Festiniog still being barren well into the 1970s and then there was that massive fire that wiped out quite a lot of vegetation in the 1980s. 1982 rings a bell. Quite a common occurrence over the years apparently.

 

Some 1960s footage here showing how bleak it was.

 

 

 

Jason

[Paul H Vigor]

3 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Not just Elizabeth's. Wooden shipbuilding was probably at its peak in the early nineteenth century, as we fought Napoleon, and the British Empire was at its peak, but before iron ships became common.

 

The slate and metal mines of North Wales didn't need much in the way of pit props. which are more associated with coal mining.

Most shipbuilding timber was bought from private estates. For example: much the the timber used for shipbuilding at Bucklers Hard, Hampshire, came from the Montagu Estate.

[Wickham Green too]

I'm not sure there was an awful lot of land which we'd not classify as 'private estates' ....... most common land was under agriculture or grazing and pretty short on mature trees.

[Michael Hodgson]

The Forestry Commission was founded in 1919 to re-establish woodland following WW1 specifically in order to provide a strategic reserve in case there should ever be another war.  Even though the RN ships were no longer powered by sails slung from timber masts and built mainly of wood, they still used a lot of timber, and our woodlands had become sadly depleted. 

Not for the first time - shortage of timber for the dockyards was the reason Admiral Nelson came to Monmouth.

 

Although the Commission has been reorganised in this century for political reasons, it had been the driving force behind the establishment of Kielder Forest in Northumberland, the largest man-made forest in Europe, as well as owning and managing many other forests all over the UK.  My late father worked for them when I was born, and he said he one of his duties was to change the name of their office building at Lyndhurst in the New Forest from King's House to Queen's House on the Accession of Elizabeth II.  I really must drop in and tell them they need to change it back!

[Paul H Vigor]

4 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

I'm not sure there was an awful lot of land which we'd not classify as 'private estates' ....... most common land was under agriculture or grazing and pretty short on mature trees.

https://newforestguide.uk/history/new-forest-shipbuilding/

[john new]

11 hours ago, rodent279 said:

Wasn't large areas of forest removed to build Elizabeth's navy? And I guess later on a lot of forest was used for pit props.

Different tree types. (oak for ships, evergreens for pit props to replace Baltic sourced imports.) As posted above rampant sycamores. If you look at 1950s photos of where I live - no trees. Now quite extensive patches of them growing extensively and their seed propellers landing in the hundreds from every tree and growing in any crack they can find. I spend a lot of time in the spring uprooting the tiny seedlings from the garden. (Three neighbours have let them grow.)

 

The problem with the pit prop plantations was that by the time the UK planted one's were ready to cut and use our coal industry was being run down* and also IIRC from a trip down the mining museum's preserved pit many pit propping devices had become mechanical.

 

* let's please avoid any debate on the how and why just agree it was.

Edited September 23, 2023 by john new

[Andrew Young]

One other possible cause is of course that most people no longer have open fires to heat their homes or cook their food. So no longer are on the hunt for fuel or kindling. 

[figworthy]

9 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

I think it's more a case of how quickly nature takes over when people (and animals) look the other way.

 

I remember Festiniog still being barren well into the 1970s and then there was that massive fire that wiped out quite a lot of vegetation in the 1980s. 1982 rings a bell. Quite a common occurrence over the years apparently.

 

Some 1960s footage here showing how bleak it was.

 

 

 

Jason

 

A fascinating bit of film, thanks for posting it.

 

What was the car that featured in the earlier part ?

 

Adrian

[Jeremy Cumberland]

1 hour ago, figworthy said:

 

A fascinating bit of film, thanks for posting it.

 

What was the car that featured in the earlier part ?

 

Adrian

Someone on the YouTube page reckoned it is a Clyno.

 

The new road is the A496, bypassing Tan y Grisiau and Glan y Pwll, which I think was built at the same time as the Ffestiniog pumped storage scheme around 1960. At 3:40, the film shows a train running from the derelict GW station to the LNW station, which puts it some time after 1964, I think. The 2' gauge the kids are rolling a wagon along was the old Ffestiniog main line to Duffws, and was still in use to connect the quarries at that end of town to the LNW station. When the Ffestiniog Railway was re-opened to Blaenau in 1983, and the BR station moved, the 2' and standard gauge lines were swapped over.

 

Most of the the quarry scenes are of Glan y Don (or Pen y Bont), a slate tip "island" between the Afon Barlwyd and LNW line on one side and the road on the other, made from waste from the Oakeley quarry. I think 4'22" must be the incline down from Glan y Don to the LNWR station. The bridge from Glan y Don to the main Oakeley quarry then features in several views and we look down from it from about 5:06. briefly looking north, then south (with the Afon Barlwyd and the LNW line), then north again to Llechwedd on the far side, and then the LNW tunnel mouth, before dwelling on Pant-yr-Afon (Llechwedd) power station and finally following a car along the road. Glan y Don was levelled in the 1980s. It was all gone by the time I moved to Blaenau in 1989.

 

I'm wracking my brain for where the view is at 0:32. It looks very familiar. Plenty of trees there. 😀

Edited September 23, 2023 by Jeremy Cumberland

[woodenhead]

Why are there more trees - it is because of the new 20mph speed limit of course, the air has cleaned up beautifully.

[Paul H Vigor]

2 hours ago, john new said:

Different tree types. (oak for ships, evergreens for pit props to replace Baltic sourced imports.) As posted above rampant sycamores. If you look at 1950s photos of where I live - no trees. Now quite extensive patches of them growing extensively and their seed propellers landing in the hundreds from every tree and growing in any crack they can find. I spend a lot of time in the spring uprooting the tiny seedlings from the garden. (Three neighbours have let them grow.)

 

The problem with the pit prop plantations was that by the time the UK planted one's were ready to cut and use our coal industry was being run down* and also IIRC from a trip down the mining museum's preserved pit many pit propping devices had become mechanical.

 

* let's please avoid any debate on the how and why just agree it was.

Larch was considered the best timber for UK pit props - resinous, tough, less inclined to rot. Farmers often grew small plantations of larch on their land as a cash crop, which they advertised for sale in mining magazines. Problems began when colliery firms bought a distant plantation for pit timber, then had to arrange felling, tushing (dragging cut timber out of the plantation with horses) and transportation (road, and/or rail) from the plantation to the pit yard. Local contractors could be elusive and unhelpful!

[Jeremy Cumberland]

I've found this lovely photograph of Blaenau Ffestiniog by Rebecca at BecsterDotCom (I hope she doesn't mind my posting it here) that nicely complements the video, as well as showing some trees, or lack of them:

 

 

This ls looking south from above the tunnel mouth. The building on the left is Pant-yr-Afon power station, seen at the end of the video. Right in the middle of the picture, starting from where the trees are, is where Glan y Don tip used to be, and you can clearly see where the bridge used to be, with one of the piers still standing. Glan y Don tip used to cover where all the modern buildings are, right up to the railway on the right and the road on the left. All the trees you see in this area are, of course, recent plantings.

 

Apart from these, though, there aren't that many other trees. The slate tips just have some scrub on them. Cefn Trwsgl, in the middle distance behind the town, is bare (doubtless because of sheep), To the right, Moel Ystradau has a conifer plantation encompassing the summit on one side, but in the distance Moel Ysgyfarnogod is bare.

Edited September 24, 2023 by Jeremy Cumberland

[Hibelroad]

Being a keen woodworker I regard trees as a slow growing plant, we shouldn’t be afraid to cut them down and use them once they mature. They will grow again. As has been noted upthread there is a feeling these days that trees are special and should not be touched, this leads to unkempt scrubland. Funnily enough I was in some maintained parkland last week and was struck by the majesty of their specimen trees growing without interference of other vegetation, but I also commented on what fine boards and logs they would make 😁

[Wickham Green too]

There is a feeling these days that planting saplings will compensate for all the mature trees being cut down elsewhere and result in Carbon Net Zero .................. as you say, trees are slow growing plants. ☹️

[figworthy]

20 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Someone on the YouTube page reckoned it is a Clyno.

 

 

Ooh, now that is interesting.  Apparently one of my grandfathers had one in the 1930s.

 

Quote

The new road is the A496, bypassing Tan y Grisiau and Glan y Pwll, which I think was built at the same time as the Ffestiniog pumped storage scheme around 1960.

 

I'd guessed that the new looking road was related to the pump storage scheme, but thanks for confirming it.

 

Adrian

[Nearholmer]

You might enjoy this https://naturalresources.wales/days-out/places-to-visit/north-west-wales/coedydd-maentwrog/?lang=en

 

Not widely known that Tanybwlch is in a rainforest.

[SR71]

Thank you, I did that walk last year! Though hard to see how it's Celtic when my first post has it to the right and in it, and other views, there are clearly no trees. Doesn't take away from the fact that it's now a beautiful place to be though. Had we had more time we'd have walked around the lake at the bottom too.