2017 ICF East England: The Great Storm – 30 Years On
Friday 20 October 2017
Sutton Hoo, Suffolk Coast & Heaths AONB, Tranmer House, Woodbridge IP12 3DJ
The LEGACY of the 87 Storm: reflections of the day, personal and tree, the aftermath clear up. CLIMATE CHANGE, the pattens of historic storms, the projection of future storms and contingency plans, government and non government.
I arrived late – an accident on the Orwell bridge (I hear later a man died) – meant finding an ancient Suffolk Church down a B road for both the dogs and I to stretch and cock legs, and arriving 2 hours late for the day long seminar.
Tim de Kreyzer must have been talking – summarising the 87 legacy as becoming part of a broader base. The Forest Commission worked along side Community Forests /Common Ground.
Mark Broadmeadow, from the Forestry Commission
Extreme weather events in the UK
Clear evidence of matching rise of CO2 (1% since industrial revolution, 2-4% predicted) to extreme weather – excluding volcanic activity – irrefutable. Basically EW, wetter dryer / NW colder hotter.
Government response: – 2008 Climate Change Act, with Risk Assessment every 5 years, next one due 2018.
Message no need for any contingency. Mark disagrees.
1987 – 3,900,000 m2 timber down (15 million trees).
1990 – Burns – 1,200,000m2 – January leaves off trees
2013 St Judes – 2,000,000m2
Risks
- Fire – started a month earlier – little effect in the UK
- Flooding – so long as it comes and goes, trees amazingly resilient
- Temperature extremes – does not effect trees
- DROUHT – the most challenging to trees. For example the impact of the 1976 drought on Beech Treeshttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23419036Growth of the trees is still restricted more than 30 years later, a study in the journal Functional Ecology said. The more drought-tolerant Sessile Oak survived better and is now dominating the beech. They are resistant up to a point and then we hit a tipping point and the system shows very severe impacts The scientific work was carried out at Lady Wood Park in the Wye Valley. This 45 hectare (111 acre) site is a national nature reserve and is attractive to researchers because it has been deliberately unmanaged since 1945.
Although Government say no contingency necessary, Mark disagrees:
- be aware, acquaint knowledge
- New planting, stocking to suit change of climate – drought resistant etc.
- Base stocking on soil type
- Back to Silviculture
Generally, silviculture is the science and art of growing and tending forest crops, based on a knowledge of silvics, i.e., the study of the life history and general characteristics of forest trees and stands, with particular reference to locality factors.[2] More particularly, silviculture is the theory and practice of controlling the establishment, composition, constitution, and growth of forests. No matter how forestry as a science is constituted, the kernel of the business of forestry has historically been silviculture, as it includes direct action in the forest, and in it all economic objectives and technical considerations ultimately converge.[3] The focus of silviculture is regeneration, but more recently, recreational use of forestland has challenged silviculture as the primary income generation from forests, due to increasing recognizance of forestland’s use for leisure and recreation.
Planning for the Future
Neal Evans (Suffolk Joint Emergency Planning Unit)
Suffolk unusual in that all local authorities have joined together for an Emergency Planning unit – only one other county done the same in the UK. More joined up.
Assessment of RISKS
- Natural weather warnings are all dire today.
- Society is less able to cope now than it was in the past – despite the fact we have more technological advantages like warnings, like working from home.
- People expect more. We used to have 3 days to sort it out. After Grenville we have less than 24 hours.
1987 Storm in Suffolk – 435,000m2 conifer, 80,000 private, 200,000 broad-leafed private
Prices of wood dipped. Quality good. Exported. Dangerous trees still stood as too busy clearing up from storm.
Countryside Commission – dissolved into Natural England
Outing to Rendlesham Forest
Needing to stretch dogs legs, i missed most of lunch, but wondered down the track to Sutton Hoo site, and afterwards saw some of the film. From what I recall, story is of the people (classic news headline from the Daily Mail 1937 at the time – ‘Gold Bounty to go to Woman’ – who was Edith Pretty, widow of Colonel Frank Pretty. Following her bereavement, Mrs Pretty became interested in spiritualism, a religion that placed belief in the idea that the spirits of the deceased could be contacted. Mrs Pretty in 1937 decided to organise an excavation of the mounds. Through the Ipswich Museum she obtained the services of Basil Brown a self-taught Suffolk archaeologist who had taken up full-time investigations of Roman sites for the museum. In June 1938, Pretty took him to the site, offered him accommodation and a wage of 30 shillings a week, and suggested that he start digging at Mound 1.Because it had been disturbed by earlier grave diggers, Brown, in consultation with the Ipswich Museum, decided instead to open three smaller mounds (2, 3 and 4). These only revealed fragmented artefacts, as the mounds had been robbed of valuable items.In Mound 2 he found iron ship-rivets and a disturbed chamber burial that contained unusual fragments of metal and glass artefacts. The Ipswich Museum then became involved with the excavations.
Back to our expedition to Rendlesham:
Richard Bark/Ben Mattock/Terry Jennings
Keith Kirby Natural England
I admired his tie – full of frogs:
‘Yes, my wife thinks i look like a frog, so over the years she’s given me and I’ve acquired various clothes imprinted with frogs.
‘Ah a term of affection’
‘Indeed, we have been married for 39 years’
Someone else arrives and they exchange news on retirement
Wonderful retirement- I can go to places because they are beautiful and not because they have a problem. (I exchange with my Indian equivalent – Bhopal, Ankeleshwar but never the Taj Mahal)
Later Mark tells me in an email Keith (Kirby) is a treasure trove of information and an internationally recognised expert in his field – woodland ecology.
https://www.plants.ox.ac.uk/people/keith-kirby
Rendlesham Forest is a 1,500-hectare mixed woodland in Suffolk owned by the Forestry Commission. In 1980, there were a series of reported sightings of unexplained lights near Rendlesham Forest which have become linked with claims of UFO landings. RAF Woodbridge was used at the time by the U.S. Air Force and USAF personnel, including deputy base commander Lieutenant Colonel claimed to see things they described as a UFO sighting.The occurrence is the most famous of claimed UFO events to have happened in the UK, ranking among the best-known reported UFO events worldwide. It has been compared to the Roswell UFO incident in the United States and is sometimes referred to as “Britain’s Roswell”.
Sandlings. The land runs beside a MOD runway, in which they are now researching the landing of an air bus on soft sand – as most of our wars these days taken place in sandy areas. The wire around the permitter – all 3 miles of it – is hinged to allow for some lee way on the wings of an air bus landing in soft sand.
Planted with monoculture of CORSICAN PINE post 87 storm, planted in 1993. But Corsican Pine this is not the GOTO crop of yesteryear.
Someone called FRED – influenced policy. Fred is Fred Currie who in 1987 was the Forestry Commission’s Conservation Adviser for the East of England. He retired about 10 years ago.
- broke with the mono culture of CP
- Night Jar and Wood Larch important and liked in open spaces
- Leave piles of dead wood
- Plant broad leafed as wind protector
Pests was a concentrated subject unsurprising with such a monoculture.
Beetles such as Dothistroma needle blight (Dothistroma septosporum)
Tomicus piniperda
Now leaving land 2-3 years fallow best antidote to pests.
Putting fungus on the stump is a more effective dissolver than DDT, Lindane, Urea.
Scots Pine more drought resistant – the remains of the original planted in the 1980’s
Now 25 species not one
Now FC considering Strip Felling.
As we were leaving a couple came up to me, the woman commending me on my pink rain jacket – it was indeed an anathema to the uniform of foresters green or karki. We exchanged contacts, and a few days later Michael (not Clare as she was working) Brett came up to my woodland and nourished me with his enthusiasm and pointers to other organisations and books.
A BIT ABOUT The GREAT STORM
The gale that struck south-east England in the early hours of 16 October 1987 caused the worst damage to trees ever recorded in this country. An estimated 15 million trees were blown down, representing 3.9 million cubic metres of timber. This volume almost equals the total o f the three previous major storms which occurred in January 1953 (in north-east Scotland), in January 1968 (in the west Highlands and the central belt of Scotland) and in January 1976 (in Wales, the Midlands and East Anglia) which together blew down an estimated 4.1 million cubic metres of timber.
A major lesson from the storm is the desirability of managing the tree stock to create a more balanced age structure, thus avoiding a preponderance of overmature trees – an objective which will enhance both their landscape value and productivity, as well as reducing the impact of any future storm.
The storm which struck south-east England on the night of 15/16 October 1987 was the worst in the region since 1703: it caused more damage to woodlands and trees than any other recorded gale in Britain. Some 4 million cubic metres of timber were blown, equivalent to about 5 years’ cut in the seven worst affected counties. Broadleaved trees predominated and 72% of the damage occurred to privately owned woodlands and trees. The Forestry Commission set up a Forest Windblow Action Committee shortly after the storm for the purpose of assessing the damage, advising on the clearance and marketing of timber and recommending any action considered appropriate. A major concern was the potential degrade of logs left unharvested. Losses in value from this cause have not been as high as originally feared. Supplies of wood in other parts of the country were held back and many contractors moved teams into the affected region. Clearance of some 65% of the blown volume had been achieved by June 1989.
Kaliwood 