Planting of trees and bushes

Planting of trees and bushes

Many areas of oak dominated landscapes have steadily been declining and gone lost for a long time. Today there is barely one fourth of the oak dominated environments left since the 16th century. The amount of really old oaks has reduced by an even bigger scale. The cause of the reduction is mainly due to changes in management within agriculture where a large portion of meadows and pasture land have been taken out of haymaking and grazing. Big areas of oak habitat have also been transformed into production forests where conifers are being promoted on the cost of oaks. The large reduction of oak habitat and the increasing distances between old oaks that this leads to means that a lot of plants and animals dependent on old oaks have become very rare and threatened.

In this project we will plant oaks, other broadleaved trees, bushes and trees with berries and flowers to increase the area of oak habitat in the future and to reduce the distance between valuable oak habitat. This will enhance the possibility for plants and animals dependent on oak to increase their populations. The planting will also facilitate for a lot of species to be able to spread to new areas. Flowering small trees and bushes such as rowan, sweet cherry, blackthorn, hawthorn and rose hip are important in oak environments because they produce nectar and pollen that many oak dependent animals need. They also work as a breeding site for many insects. Planting will be made in 20 project areas.