compete with each other. Growing very closely together but being regularly cut meant that numerous
trees could exist side by side (Plate 26). In the Forest the last hundred years has seen a marked change
in the structure of the wooded parts of the Forest, the vigorous pollard Beeches over-topping and
outcompeting the light demanding Oak pollards, resulting ultimately in the Oak's demise. Hornbeam
pollards are less affected because they tend to grow on moister clay, whereas Beech tends to grow on
gravels, but even Hornbeams are overshadowed by nearby Oaks in places such as Gilbert's Slade.
In a few places in the Forest in recent years some experimental pollarding of trees has taken place.
The earliest was in Woodman's Glade in Bury Wood, Chingford in 1948 and 1954. More recently
some experimental pollarding has been undertaken in a number of areas in the Forest. The reason for
this is that once pollarding ceases, the trees assume a natural life span - it may be that in a hundred
years time there will be very few pollards remaining in the Forest if the existing trees are not lopped.
A further reason is that many Beech pollards having very shallow root systems (Plate 23) and growing
on thin gravelly soils are unstable. The unlopped regrowth makes the trees top heavy and, as has been
shown in recent storms, are only too easily toppled over (Plate 22). I have personal knowledge of
experimental re-pollarding in the following areas:-
Debden Slade (Hornbeam, Oak. some Beech)
Loughton Camp (Oak)
Bury Wood (mainly Hornbeam and some Oak) (Plate 21)
Loughton Brook (mainly Hornbeam)
Broadstrood/Furze Ground /Copley Plain/Hangboy Slade (Oak, Beech and
Hornbeam)
High Beach (Beech)
Between Manor Road and Buckhurst Hill Cricket Pitch (Hornbeam)
Walthamstow Forest (mainly Hornbeam)
Bell Common (Oak)
Lords Bushes (Hornbeam)
Chingford Golf Course (Oak and Hornbeam)
This re-pollarding is very encouraging from a conservation point of view. If continued on a regular
basis over many decades, not just years, it will provide continuity of micro-habitat needed by many
of the rare invertebrates associated with the old. over-mature trees. Of the above sites, three assume
a greater significance. Broadstrood, Bury Wood and Bell Common are important because young trees
(at the former two sites Hornbeams and at the latter Oaks) have been topped. These are the only new
pollard trees to have been created in the Forest within the last hundred years.
Pollard Tree Species
Most visitors to the Forest are familiar with the Beech, Oak and Hornbeam pollards of the Forest
(Plates 1, 2 and 3). Few realise that at least 17 species are or were known.
Other tree species that occur as pollards include Service (Sorbus torminalis): I know of a few trees
near Loughton Camp, one near the Warren and another near the Robin Hood. Maple (Acer campestre):
a single, very large tree is to be found not far from Connaught Water. Ash (Fraxinus excelsior): a few
are scattered about the Forest, for example on Yardley Hill, on the 'ghost' boundary of Birch Wood
at Theydon Bois and by North Farm. (The first two sites are outside the physical forest as defined on
the Chapman & Andre map.) Sycamore (Acer pseudoplatanus): at least two specimens are found in
Wanstead Park. Sweet Chestnut (Castanea sativa): Bush Wood, Leytonstone has at least five large
specimens of this tree with girths of between 13 ft. 2 ins. and 20 ft. The trees, despite being very close
together and varying so widely in girth, were apparently all planted at the same time in the late 17th
century as part of the landscaping for Wanstead park (Ramsey and Fowkes, 1986). Elm pollards in
the Forest probably never were common; it is more a tree of farmland locally. Elm seems to have been
badly recorded and many were lost to Dutch Elm Disease. Oliver Rackham noted a few East Anglian
Elm (Ulmus minor) pollards in the Lower Forest (Rackham, 1978) and F. W. Elliott photographed an
English Elm (U. procera) pollard on Yardley Hill in 1898: all these are now gone. The only pollard
Elm 1 know of still living and actually growing within the physical forest and not on a boundary bank,
is the magnificent tree at Woodredon, with a girth of 10 ft. 10 ins., a tree very worthy of special
protection; it may be a Lineage Elm, one of a group of ancient woodland elms (Plate 25). I know of
a single Hawthorn (Crataegus monogyna) pollard just off the Red Path near Connaught Water: it has
a girth of 5 ft. Pollard Thorns are more frequent in Hatfield Forest. In Epping Forest, Thorn, along
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