Tall and elegant, the English elm once graced our countryside in its millions, until disease struck it down. But all is not lost. Conservationists now hope the elm will be reborn, thanks to the work of scientists and volunteers, discovers Rob McGowan
Rob McGowan is a journalist and editor based in Eastbourne, who has a background in geography and environmental economics.
Chiffchaffs chirped, Pevensey Castle’s blue and yellow flags fluttered in the spring sunshine, a breeze rustled the bare branches of a stand of tall trees – and all seemed well in this corner of Sussex.
Those tall trees are English elms, Ulmus procera – an iconic species that once stood sentinel across Britain’s lowland landscape, their straight, slender trunks and billowing, thundercloud-like canopies immortalised by countless artists and poets. In folklore, elms often had a sinister, rather Gothic reputation, as they were associated with death, partly because of their habit of suddenly shedding branches.
For centuries, elm wood was prized for its toughness and beautiful swirling grain, and fashioned into everything from flooring to furniture, cartwheels, tools and coffins. Because elm holds its shape and strength when waterlogged, it was often used in ships’ keels, lock gates and water wheels. Elms were also renowned for the ecosystems they supported, including 80 species of invertebrate, notably the white-letter hairstreak butterfly and myriad moths.
However, the elms that framed Salisbury Cathedral in John Constable’s famous 1823 landscape are long gone, decimated by waves of Dutch elm disease (DED). By the late 1970s, around 25 million trees had perished and the species had largely slipped from the collective memory.
But not entirely. Like Asterix’s Gaulish village, the English elm clung on, unheralded, in a few areas. Parts of East Sussex remained a stronghold: a slice of coast and countryside between Brighton and Pevensey. The combination of sea breezes and the largely treeless South Downs may have created an area that the elm bark beetle, which spreads the disease, could not access in large numbers.
THE PLAGUE RETURNS
Anthony Becvar is a tree health officer at East Sussex County Council (ESCC); a large part of his job has been to protect the elms, which are now globally significant. During the winter of 2011, Becvar and his colleagues set out in search of the remaining mature elms, walking for miles alo
