Country diary: a chainsaw massacre from the alder woods

n an overcast, drizzly afternoon at Durham Wildlife Trust’s Low Barns nature reserve, alder (Alnus glutinosa) provided the brightest splash of colour from the landscape.

A tree have been felled and sawn into logs. Chainsaw wounds about this species will be similar to a massacre, because shortly after the timber is cut, it turns a lurid shade of red, almost like blood, in stark contrast on the battleship-grey bark. Eventually those wounds, which briefly resemble raw meat, fade to orange and ultimately to chestnut brown.

When this reserve was established five decades ago, around old gravel pits, some moisture-loving alders were planted to aid revegetate a bare, windswept site. Alder wood is among the finest resources for charcoal, plus the plantation trees are of sufficient age now to be coppiced, to form barbecue fuel.

There is also a vital natural alder wood here, produced by a cataclysm almost two and a half centuries ago, which concluded in the designation of the reserve being a site of special scientific interest.

The Great Flood of 1771 swept through Weardale, washing away bridges to the coast. If your water subsided, the path of the River Wear had shifted half one mile south, plus the old riverbed became what exactly is the reserve’s Long Alder Wood, optimum instance of this category in the region.

In winter, gets hotter sometimes floods, this tangle of gnarled trees contains a hint with the Florida Everglades regarding it, with mossy, fallen trunks sinking back into the ooze. All year round, you can find wonderful the opportunity to watch birds from an embankment level while using tree canopy. This afternoon an acrobatic flock of approximately 30 goldfinches bounced and chattered through the twigs, feeding on tiny seeds that fall in the woody cones.

Sadly, since mid-1990s, another catastrophe has befallen this locally unique woodland: alder dieback disease has killed around half the mature trees. Coppicing is creating some regeneration, though on this precious habitat dead timber is allowed to lay where it falls, available the demands of an easy community of fungi, invertebrates and woodpeckers, rather than back-garden burger-flippers on summer evenings.

This content was corrected on 6 December 2018 from Alnus incana, the non-native grey alder, to Alnus glutinosa, the native common alder that is definitely common to Witton-le-Wear.