For thousands of years, it’s been one of the three most numerous trees in our woodlands and it was used by our ancestors to make bows and spears. Though not a long-lived tree compared to the oak, there are nevertheless ash trees in Britain more than 1,000 years old.
But for more than a decade, conservationists have feared the ash tree could all but disappear from the countryside as a result of a fungus, originally from China, which arrived here from Europe in imported trees and blown across the English Channel.
It has even been predicted that ash dieback disease could kill up to 85 per cent of our ash trees, which number an estimated 150 million.
Now scientists say that there’s hope – and it’s all thanks to evolution. A new study has found subtle changes in the ash tree’s DNA which may afford future generations resistance to ash dieback.
Richard Buggs, professor of evolutionary genomics at Queen Mary University of London, says it now seems the ash will not “go the way of the elm in Britain” which all but disappeared from the countryside in the 1970s and 80s as a result of Dutch elm disease.
“Ash are showing a very different dynamic because they produce an abundance of seedlings upon which natural selection can act when they are still young,” he says. Indeed, ash trees produce 100,000 of their distinctive green-winged 'keys’ every two years.
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It’s been predicted that ash die back could cost the UK £15 billion in lost ecosystem services over 100 years, and so concerned has the Government been that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has invested £9 million in research into the disease since 2012, including funding this latest study.
“It contributes significantly to our knowledge base by demonstrating that tolerance to ash dieback is heritable and highlights that breeding programmes and natural regeneration could work together to secure the future for our native ash tree,” says Defra’s chief plant officer Nicola Spence.
Ash trees make up about 12 per cent of Britain’s broad-leaved or deciduous woodlands. More than 950 species depend on them for their own survival including nearly 550 lichens, 240 invertebrates, 28 mammals and 12 birds – 44 of these species have only ever been found on ash.
Signs of ash dieback are orange-brown lesions on the stems and dead shoots and branches. In the summer, leaves turn black, wilt and fall off.
Main image: Ash tree. Credit: Getty
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