A Deeply Rooted Problem
Landscape and tree management intersect challengingly with our role as custodians of a listed building here at Wytham Abbey. We have two distinct and quite different tree/building conflicts: one is a beautiful, mature holm oak, which is rather closer to the main building than is ideal; and the second is a substantial 150m-long, 19th-century limestone wall which has been dramatically twisted and deformed in five locations by mature lime, beech and horse chestnut.
The holm oak can be carefully managed, and kept under control, relatively easily. But the trees and the wall present a far more knotty challenge.
The wall has the statutory protection of the criminal law: wilful damage to it would lead to prosecution, and we are obliged as its owners to conserve it. None of the trees, on the other hand, benefit from the comparable protection of a Tree Preservation Order, but their location inside a Conservation Area does prevent them being felled or thinned without approval. The wall is now in its third century of life, and can probably keep up for hundreds of years more; the trees, while not as venerable, have also been around for a long time, and are likely entering their prime. The trees break the wall, and the wall chokes the trees. Which do we save?
Visible damage at the southeast corner of the wall at Wytham Abbey
While listed structures and trees are protected by different laws, in this case it is still clear: the wall is a “heritage asset” and enjoys far greater protection than the trees which have been blithely bending it out of shape for the past few decades. So, while the law is clear-cut, the factors feeding into our decision-making are not.
The first and easiest decision we’ve taken is to arrange for the wall to receive the attention of someone — Mike David Jones — who has many old buildings on his CV. Reassuringly, Mike has already rebuilt a very different, much taller listed wall at Wytham which was storm-damaged in 2021, and we’re looking forward to welcoming him back.
We’ll also monitor the movement in the wall. And with our knowledgeable and thoughtful tree surveyor, Nick Dunbar, we’ve explored the practicalities of phased removal and replacement of some of the trees. But even gradual removal of the trees would need to be carried out with great care, given the incredibly tight embrace that they find themselves in with the wall, and the risk that abrupt removal could cause the ground to shift, and damage the masonry even further.
Ultimately, it has been gratifying to have engaged with Nick Dunbar on this challenge, because he has exemplified what interdisciplinary working is and can achieve at its best. By summer 2023, we’ll be ready with another update on this story, a version of which will play out wherever in the world trees and buildings find themselves side by side.
