Philosophy

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As a child I was brought up on a tenant farm on the edge of a large estate. One of my first  memories is of thousands of elm trees dying of Dutch Elm disease and watching timber companies come in to fell these very large dead and dangerous trees.

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One of the problems, at the time, was that so many trees died. The wood then became worthless and therefore the land owner had to pay the timber companies to fell and take the trees away. This resulted in the land owners being reluctant to replant the trees for fear of future cost. I was disappointed to find out that Dutch Elm disease was brought into this country from America by importing cheap American elm timber. 

 

From a very young age I could see that if we did not manage woodland in a sustainable manner the long term damage to our environment was inevitable. Instances such as Dutch Elm disease and the damage to trees in the hurricanes of '87 and more recently Ash Dieback may have been avoided with some care and long term planning. 

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The woodlands we maintain are based mainly in North Hertfordshire and Bedfordshire. We are restoring coppice woodlands back to how they were traditionally managed to produce fuel and other woodland products for the local market.

 

All firewood we supply comes from sustainable sources and this includes many woods such as: ash, beech, silver birch, sycamore and hornbeam.

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The firewood is sourced locally from sustainable woodland. This reduces effects on the environment and the financial cost to the customer by limiting the transport distances. 

There is a misconception that burning logs for heat ruins the environment and adds to global warming. However firewood is not a fossil fuel and comprises of carbon molecules recently fixed from the surrounding environment. If these logs are burnt the carbon molecules are released as carbon dioxide but will not add to the total amount of carbon dioxide in the world. If the tree was not cut down for firewood it would mature, die and eventually rot, thus releasing the carbon it had trapped from the atmosphere. To counter the effects of global warming it is important to re-grow or replant trees (trapping more carbon dioxide) which can be used as firewood or timber.

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Effectively every log burnt to provide heat stops us burning coal, oil or gas which does have an effect our environment.

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Patrick Hart