Nothing new under the sun - old knowledge in a new setting

摘要

Our attitudes towards woodland in the British landscape and our treatment of it down the centuries reflect the peaks and troughs of economic demand, the changing nature of society and a shifting political climate. Whatever the human vagaries, the trees themselves have always continued to reproduce, regenerate and re-grow. They have done so as we have developed and forgotten, re-developed, lost and re-discovered skills of woodland and forest husbandry and as the use of woodlands and their benefits have changed. This ebb and flow is typical of the nature of woodland history in its detail and in its larger canvas across the UK.