We are indebted to Malinda Griffin, the Havant Treewardens coordinator, for the following reference information.
The Ancient Tree Forum
The Ancient Tree Forum is a small but dedicated group with huge amounts of expertise and information on their site – There you will find info on measuring tree girth, including those with leaning trunks, multi-stemmed or forking trees, burred or knobbly trees. Coppiced and pollarded trees of traditional origin are very interesting though not properly recorded yet. You’ll find lovely lovely examples in old local hedgerows, and some nice examples on the north side of Emsworth Road in Havant, heading east from the Wheelwright Arms.
The Woodland Trust
The Woodland Trust has an enormous amount on its website, including resources for children in the form of Citizen Science projects with ‘how to’ sheets to download. They work with the Ancient Tree Forum on the Ancient Tree Hunt www.ancient-tree-hunt.org.uk and on the Ancient Tree Inventory. On this site you can enter images, measurements, observations and grid references and receive back confirmation of the categories of trees.
To find out more about which species and size of tree qualifies to be a ‘veteran tree’, take the link to view the Veteran Tree List which will relate tree species to trunk girth and thus to category of interest.
The Tree Council
The Tree Council is the ‘umbrella’ organisation of Tree Wardens – smaller than the Woodland Trust, but offers resources and direct support to TWs through the Network scheme (e.g. Havant TW network within which sit regional groups like Emsworth or Hayling I or Havant Town TWs). They have regional coordinator forums to develop national schemes (e.g. Ash Die-back monitoring project) and seasonal community activities (e.g. tree seed planting)
CAVAT – Capital Asset Value for Amenity Trees
CAVAT provides a basis for managing trees in the UK as public assets rather than liabilities. It is designed not only to be a strategic tool and aid to decision-making in relation to the tree stock as a whole, but also to be applicable to individual cases, where the value of a single tree needs to be expressed in monetary terms. It is intended particularly for councils and other Public Authorities and primarily for publicly owned trees. The Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (sections 198 & 199) establishes that trees have value as a public amenity and that local planning authorities have a duty to act to protect trees in the public interest.
The fifteen page document outlines a professional method for determining the asset value of the trees in the borough and for further information, please take this link to view a copy.
Havant Civic Society 