Newness

A time of year to celebrate the new. Not something that comes easily you would think to those long in the tooth. Amongst conservationists, many of whom are much younger, you might expect to find that the appeal of young woods is more appreciated. But my reading suggests they get little mention as against the focus on ancient woodland. I'm not wishing to knock that at all. Older trees are immensely fulfilling and fascinating and score heavily with the ecological number crunching which measures value through biomass.

But to exclude from consideration the vibrant joy of fresh growth when it has so much to offer seems close to dogma. Too often I've come across younger, well qualified conservation workers who seem not to sense the appeal of young growth and young trees. It as if at some time in the past they've been through a semi-painful conversion where their ignorance has been exposed by a knowall: "nothing worth looking at there! this is really what you should be looking at!" Once set on the right path there is no looking back. The tendency to underrate birch and other shorter-living trees fits this pattern.

But to be out at the new beginning of a new day in spring with newly arrived songbirds among the new foliage of younger trees is to be refreshed invigorated and moved. Strange coming from one whose tastes usually go the other way. But that's in man made artefacts. Nature is something else