Why everyone should have a favourite tree

From my house, I see a lot of trees. We live on the edge of the city, just before it butts into the country, and the view from the back, over rooftops, is of trees. They climb out from the White Cart river valley, and up over the hill towards Glasgow. Mostly birch, ash and some oak, they signal the seasons.

In winter frost sits between them. Sometimes early morning mist rises through them. On dark, quiet summer nights, I can hear owls call from over there. I assume they’re owls. I’ve decided they’re owls.  

The trees are coming into leaf now. I have no doubt that this view, and its changes, has had a calming impact on me for the years we’ve lived there – the external talking the internal dialogue down from its frantic spin. 

Clearly, there is something beneficial in being around trees. A few years ago, the Japanese idea of forest bathing became voguish. In reality, it’s been around since antiquity, but give something a Sunday supplement picture spread and a mention of mindfulness and you’re at the races! 

• UK tree planting is being ‘outpaced’ by the number lost in climate change events
• ‘The image says it all’: The meaning behind Banksy’s London tree mural, revealed
• Rural life can worsen mental ill health – but therapy in nature helps people feel grounded

I like stories about trees. Not like the Magic Faraway Tree, though obviously that has its moments. But real trees. There are around three billion trees in the UK, more than at any point in the last 100 years. In early April, in England, the result of a count of the non-woodland trees was revealed. They used satellites and laser detection, rather than a bloke with a big ring binder and a biro. Though it’s still an impressive feat, is it not?

The information will be used to help work out where best to plant more trees, where to give nature a boost. Recent government research put a figure on the value of non-woodland trees. In late 2022 Forest Research and Defra calculated the number at £3.8bn. They based it, they said, on the role trees play “in sequestering and storing carbon, regulating temperatures, strengthening flood resilience and reducing noise and air pollution”. The hard numbers prove value. 

There’s a rub. Like many other things, lower-income areas have fewer trees, therefore they are losing out, again, on something that could have positive outcomes. There is a Westminster governmental commitment to get to 16.5% of England as a whole covered by trees by 2050 (there is no UK-wide target). Many organisations are pushing for an increase on that, both in woodlands and beyond.

Perhaps the best way is to make people feel as invested in the bigger national growth as they did when the Sycamore Gap tree was felled in September 2023. Follow-up stories on that keep coming. Last week, another significant tree was cut down. An oak, thought to be around 500 years old, was felled in North London by the pub chain that owns Toby Carvery. They cited health and safety concerns. Clearly, there’s still work to be done. 

I have a favourite tree. It’s not very grand, just a crooked ash beside a road I like to walk. I’d feel very sad if it was cleared away. There is no deep reason for this. Like most trees, to badly paraphrase Gertrude Stein when asked what she liked about her pal Picasso’s work, I like it because I like to look at it. 

Paul McNamee is editor of the Big Issue. Read more of his columns here. Follow him on X.

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