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Music, radio, podcasts. That's

0:14

a big peduncular oak, Wurkus roba. Beach.

0:18

Oh, that's a lovely one, isn't it?

0:20

Oh, look at that. How tall is that? I

0:23

would say that's actually probably about 25 metres. So there

0:25

are trees that are bigger than that in this woodland. Some

0:29

of the beaches possibly going up to 35 metres. Yeah,

0:32

that's got some dominance, hasn't it? It really

0:34

has.

0:35

Do you get a buzz around

0:37

certain trees? Do you really feel

0:39

that connection? Yeah, definitely. And that's

0:41

one of the things that I'm really doing this walk

0:43

for, is that moment of meeting an ancient tree. There's

0:48

like a moment of true awe. And

0:50

I think that's something that we don't get much

0:53

of sometimes in life, really. Do

0:56

you need to touch it? I do sometimes.

0:58

You go for it. Yeah. Be

1:01

prepared today on Ramblings for a

1:04

true immersion in trees. And I'm

1:06

looking at Martin and he's gone up towards

1:08

this enormous oak and

1:11

has just placed his hand on it, leaning into it. And

1:14

Martin Hoogie works for

1:16

the Woodland Trust, but he's taken four months off

1:18

because he is walking from Land's

1:21

End to John O'Groats, but he's doing

1:23

it via incredible

1:25

trees. Different route

1:28

to take, a different reason, a different signposting. And

1:31

we are spending today in one of

1:33

the great forests of the south

1:35

of England. We're in Savanagh Forest, just

1:38

outside

1:38

Marlborough in Wiltshire. It's 4,500 acres in

1:40

total. And

1:43

how many named trees are there

1:45

in Savanagh Forest? Do you

1:47

know, Martin?

1:47

Well, on this map

1:49

here, it's telling me there's 32

1:52

named oaks to find. This is

1:54

quite unusual in a way for my,

1:57

what I'm calling an ancient tree pilgrimage.

1:59

that there's so many concentrated

2:02

in one area. So the

2:04

map that we've got here, this is what you

2:06

were given in the campsite, so anybody

2:09

can get, can I just see the front of it? So

2:11

anyone could pick one of these up. It's

2:15

just the guide to Savanac Forest with 32

2:17

named oaks to find. Check

2:19

off as many as you can. The

2:22

interesting thing with Savanac Forest is it's

2:24

privately

2:25

owned by the Earl of Cardigan,

2:27

isn't it? I didn't know that. I thought we

2:29

were on a forestry England. They

2:31

manage it. They manage it. Yeah. I don't

2:34

know, you know more about it than I do. I'm

2:37

just walking through. If

2:41

we go up here then, and we

2:43

come to another crossroads, and then if we

2:45

go right we can find

2:48

old Paunchy. That's a good name

2:50

for a tree, isn't it?

2:52

How have you planned the route?

2:55

Because obviously lots of people do land's

2:57

end to John of Groats and I think they refer to it as

2:59

Le Jog or they do it

3:01

the other way around, Jogla. I've used

3:03

the ancient tree inventory as

3:05

my route plan. It's a citizen science

3:08

project, a collaboration between

3:10

the Ancient Tree Forum, the Woodland Trust

3:13

and the Tree Register. So

3:17

anyone can add trees onto the Ancient

3:19

Tree inventory and a volunteer

3:22

Ancient Tree Verifier will

3:25

go along at some point

3:27

and check if

3:29

it's a beach or an oak. Take

3:31

a measurement of it if it possibly can. Log

3:35

details about its condition,

3:38

whether it's got hollowing trunk, hollowing branches,

3:40

water pockets, lichen ferns

3:43

growing on it or a cuckoo tree coming

3:45

out of it, whether it's a pollard

3:48

or a maiden or a phoenix. It's

3:50

a dataset of our oldest

3:53

and veteran, oldest

3:55

and veteran trees.

3:57

We're

4:00

wanting to be very friendly. Hello. Hello.

4:06

It's all your marvellous.

4:08

Have we missed Old Paunchy? Do you think? I'm just worried

4:11

we won't be doing it. Yeah,

4:17

I think we have actually. We've gone too

4:19

far, haven't we? Sorry, I'm not looking

4:21

at my map. That's what we need to look at.

4:24

Do you want me to look at that one? I

4:26

think we've gone beyond Cathedral, like I think that's that

4:28

gate there, isn't it? Yeah, we've just been chatting, haven't

4:30

we? We have, yeah. Never

4:33

mind. Tell me when

4:35

I go back the other way. Are you navigating

4:37

now? No. You do? You've done a better

4:39

job than me. No, I'm not. I don't

4:42

want to. Don't make me. You can look at my

4:44

wizzing map on my phone.

4:45

I

4:47

came to Savonac Forest when I was very, very young.

4:51

Had a great aunt who lived near here.

4:55

I remember the blue belts. I remember

4:57

coming at Blue Belt time. I'd

4:58

never seen a blue forest,

5:01

so I always thought the forest was blue

5:03

all year round. I thought this is an amazing,

5:05

magical

5:05

blue forest. Something

5:10

that I think people find quite shocking is

5:12

that there's no protection for

5:15

our oldest and most ancient trees. There is

5:18

tree preservation orders, but they have

5:20

any apply generally in an urban environment.

5:24

So, an ancient tree on

5:26

a private estate where there's no public access

5:29

wouldn't qualify for tree preservation

5:31

order. So, these are our

5:33

sort of living monuments. Our oldest

5:36

trees that go back hundreds, potentially

5:38

thousands of years have no legal protection. And

5:42

there's actually a group of

5:44

my friends and colleagues who are on the

5:46

train at the moment to Poland. Poland

5:49

is one of the few countries in the world

5:52

that actually does have legal

5:54

protection for its oldest trees. And

5:56

they're going to investigate how that

5:58

applies in the practice of the world. terms, talking

6:01

to landowners, MPs, conservation

6:04

NGOs, just to see how

6:06

it might work over here because we

6:09

have buildings that are listed that

6:11

are only hundreds of years old and

6:14

yet some of these trees have been around 2,000 plus

6:17

years potentially and they

6:19

have no protection so something

6:22

certainly the Woodland Trust is campaigning to

6:24

see if they can change. The

6:28

path that we're on now, softer underfoot,

6:30

narrower as well and the light

6:34

it's tunneled through here and

6:36

all of the trees just meeting at the top

6:39

not really overlapping unless branches have slightly

6:42

fallen but patches of light

6:45

ahead of us.

6:48

Oh and here we are this is old Paunchy

6:51

so suddenly the path has opened

6:54

out because the branches of old Paunchy

6:56

dominate the sky. Gosh

6:58

look at all the fungi on this as well

7:01

so

7:01

it's split in two into

7:04

a kind of reverse L. These

7:07

trees can lose upper branches

7:10

because they've got compensatory growth

7:12

that they've started lower down and trees

7:14

will have a maximum height that they can get

7:16

to where the water just can't

7:19

get up there anymore so they start to retrench

7:21

naturally and it's one of their adaptive strategies

7:23

for survival. They will start

7:25

to retrench their upper branches and

7:28

the lower branches will start to come

7:30

out and strengthen so one of

7:32

the things that must happen with ancient trees

7:34

is the retention of lower branches

7:36

because they are like the insurance policy

7:39

for these trees and they will naturally

7:42

change shape as they go through their

7:44

hundreds of years of life they'll grow

7:47

up and then they'll grow down and they'll grow up and

7:49

they'll grow down and this

7:52

is the way they cope with a changing environment

7:54

so the classic sort of idea of a tree

7:56

an oak tree growing up and then growing down

7:58

and squat

7:59

is correct but it can

8:02

also be that they'll go back up again and they'll

8:04

come back down again and they'll just keep going. And you can see

8:06

that in the different bits of the tree that

8:08

are no longer there. You can see where there would have been other

8:11

branches that were at one

8:13

point part of this big canopy that are just not

8:15

there anymore but it's got a new big canopy, wouldn't

8:17

it?

8:18

If we were to try and put our arms

8:20

around this tree I think it would take about six people

8:23

because of the bulbous left side,

8:25

the paunch it

8:28

is a

8:28

really wide base.

8:33

This is Randings I'm ready for on BBC Sounds

8:36

and with Martin Luge. He is on a tree

8:38

pilgrimage but I'm struck

8:40

by what a gorgeous space this is for

8:43

anyone to enjoy and how accessible.

8:45

The path we're walking on is a gravel

8:47

path, it's

8:48

wide enough for four people

8:50

to walk side by side. It would be wheelchair

8:53

or pushchair accessible.

8:56

You walked Land's End to John

8:58

and Groats before didn't you? But

9:00

not quite all of it? Yeah

9:02

that's right and in some ways that's

9:04

why I'm doing this again. I tried to walk

9:07

from John and Groats to Land's End when

9:09

I was 21 and I broke my leg

9:11

after about 300 miles on the West

9:14

Island way on Connick Hill and

9:16

that was the end of that. I've just turned 50 so

9:20

it's always in my mind that I would repeat the

9:22

walk try to finish it this time but

9:25

I don't actually remember a time now when it wasn't going to

9:27

include ancient trees as the purpose.

9:30

Are you sharing it on

9:32

social media at all? I do have a Twitter

9:34

it's at tree pilgrim I've

9:37

been encouraged to get into Instagram and

9:39

that's at tree.pilgrim and

9:42

I'm doing my best to put

9:44

photos up as I go.

9:46

Look at all these flies dancing around

9:48

the top of the the bracken. What

9:51

are they? I don't know but it looks like confetti.

9:54

It does look like confetti. Hello!

10:01

I'm coming to a clearing. And

10:07

the first big

10:09

open green space we've seen

10:12

for ages. So

10:14

we've got a lot of, well they're

10:17

all hawthorns aren't they? Oh and

10:19

they're covered in their white flowers.

10:22

There must be about 20 of them and

10:25

they're well established.

10:25

Yeah and they've got

10:28

the browse line from deer and livestock

10:30

reaching up to eat.

10:31

And the sky's brightening although it's cloudy

10:34

it's still pretty

10:36

bright. I mean it makes you squint

10:39

a wee bit.

10:39

This is picnup. This

10:42

is an ancient woodland

10:44

indicator species. This small

10:46

white flower looks like a mini cow parsley.

10:48

I guess there would have been pigs,

10:50

well boar in this forest wouldn't there? What are you

10:53

guessing on? Oh yeah? It's

10:56

quite a warm jacket though. It's true.

11:01

Did you get it right for clothes? Yeah

11:04

I think I have. I spent a bit of time researching

11:07

stuff and trying things on. I've

11:09

only got three t-shirts,

11:12

three marino wool t-shirts that are

11:14

really lightweight and they don't smell too much. I've

11:16

got some really nice socks with

11:19

silver woven into them,

11:20

into the marino wool. You

11:23

don't have to wash them. Ever? Apparently.

11:26

Because they're naturally anti-fungal, anti-bacterial,

11:29

anti-whatever. And they

11:32

have proved to be very good. I've had

11:34

minimal blisters. And

11:36

what do you do for food? Tortellini

11:39

seems to become my standard

11:43

dish. It's so easy to cook. A

11:46

couple of minutes of boiling water and cherry

11:49

tomatoes, a bag of salad. There's

11:51

not a lot of me. No there's nothing

11:54

of you. I've had to make sure I'm getting

11:57

as many calories in as I possibly can really.

11:59

When the family had come to join

12:02

me and we sort of swapped over kit and I sent

12:05

the kit back, I've also asked for them to bring the scales.

12:08

So I've weighed myself and I've managed to keep

12:10

myself at my weight. So

12:12

I'm not losing weight, which I was a bit worried about.

12:19

Originally when we planned this

12:22

walk together, we were going

12:24

to meet in Bani

12:26

Brakhainiog, rakah

12:30

beacons, which

12:30

is where you would have been, but the schedule

12:32

had to change. Yeah, so

12:35

I, my spectacle started mid-April

12:37

and that Friday we drove

12:40

down to Penzance with my

12:42

wife Katie, daughter Ellie Louise and dog

12:44

Merlin. Merlin had been getting

12:46

elderly, starting to sort of

12:48

suffer from ill health. So it

12:50

was one of the things that I was really worried about

12:52

really was going away and not seeing him Merlin

12:55

again. Yeah,

12:57

oh gosh. Yeah,

13:05

so we, we

13:07

drove down on Friday night and

13:10

actually Merlin.

13:17

Yeah, so we

13:19

drove down on the Friday night and Merlin

13:22

died just

13:24

after midnight on the morning. That was cool. Still

13:27

on the walk.

13:31

We packed up the car there and then, uh, in

13:33

Penzance. We

13:37

drove through the night and we had it really

13:39

stuffy, like starting again for another

13:41

couple of weeks. He

13:44

was a good friend. Yeah. What

13:46

breed was he? He was a, he was

13:49

a lurcher. He was a deer hark, was

13:51

with Sluki and he

13:53

was just a, just a lovely boy.

13:58

I grew up with lurches.

13:59

Yeah, and my parents

14:02

that she actually unfortunately round about the same time

14:04

as as Merlin our dog

14:06

Mac had to be put down and

14:08

And you know when they cuz the lectures

14:11

are you know, they're like you and body shape They're

14:13

very very lean and when they

14:15

do start to lose even more weight

14:17

my word Yeah,

14:22

yeah Yeah, it was

14:24

a sad time, but then in some respects He

14:28

died with us with

14:30

him. Yeah in the bell

14:32

tent at the youth hostel in Penzance

14:36

We were all with him and he

14:38

just slipped away peacefully In

14:40

a way, it was quite a beautiful way for

14:43

it to happen. I actually knew

14:45

I was going away for four months Certainly

14:50

gave me permission to go

14:57

So I'm a bit behind if that's

14:59

the right way of saying it on

15:02

a pilgrimage Yeah, it

15:04

doesn't really have a timeframe

15:07

in a way it is Happening

15:10

at the pace that is happening

15:13

There's a gait up ahead of

15:15

us which slightly concerns me we

15:18

miss Braid no May

15:20

have done I think it was going to be on

15:23

our Right. Oh,

15:26

yeah, I think maybe we did Totally

15:33

understandable

15:36

So we traced back our steps

15:38

back because we had missed braising oak But

15:41

not surprisingly because I can't see a sign

15:43

on it

15:44

and also there isn't a clear There's one tiny

15:47

weenie narrow path where I think a few people have

15:50

gone to it They are

15:52

all so different because that one hardly

15:55

any leaves lots of lots of Arthritic

15:59

fingers, you know

15:59

knobbly gnarly. Fingers

16:02

of branches. Big

16:05

beach tree on the left with a huge

16:07

branch that's fallen to the ground. So

16:11

I was told many years ago that if

16:13

you look upwards at trees you'll

16:15

see that their branches touch but don't overlap

16:18

and that they're very polite with each other but I

16:21

think in South Mac Forest they're less polite.

16:25

I think they're hugging each other some of these they're definitely

16:27

holding hands.

16:28

So I had us

16:30

go in left here and then a right

16:33

to take us down to the king oak and queen oak. How

16:36

are we doing for time? We're right, quarter past twelve.

16:38

Yeah, sounds good.

16:41

Good news is there are so many named

16:43

oaks that we're bound to come across something. Yeah.

16:51

Amidst all of these big tall proud

16:54

strong ancient trees there

16:57

are a few that stand out and the original

17:00

queen oak doesn't stand out because she

17:02

is tall anymore she's not. She

17:05

is hollow you

17:06

can see right through the trunk because

17:08

it's fractured through the middle but there is still

17:10

growth on her. She's probably only 10,

17:13

12 meters

17:15

high.

17:18

Not even that actually probably eight meters.

17:22

Yeah there's only a little bit of growth

17:24

on that on that top section but that

17:27

tree could just carry on going for hundreds

17:29

of years it could regrow from that. Really?

17:32

Yeah.

17:33

Because that looks so fragile to me. That

17:36

bit is and that that's going to drop away at

17:38

some point but it's got

17:41

a healthy canopy for the size of the

17:44

remaining living wood so as

17:46

long as it's it can put on enough growth it's

17:48

got enough light so that it's been given it's

17:51

had trees taken out around it to

17:53

be given enough light

17:55

and space and what's called haloing

17:58

a tree like this.

17:59

and so hopefully

18:03

she's got enough light left to put

18:06

in enough growth to strengthen what remains and

18:08

could just carry on going.

18:10

They say that actually the Queen Oak was planted

18:14

to celebrate the wedding of Henry VIII

18:16

and Jane Seymour so that is 1536. Nearly 500 years isn't it?

18:22

Yeah. It took me

18:24

rather a long time to write that! 16, 17, 18, 19, 20 and

18:27

we're in 2023 so it's at 490 odd. Yeah.

18:37

Not very far away from the

18:39

original Queen Oak is the new Queen Oak.

18:41

Now I was expecting quite a young tree but

18:44

it's enormous. I mean

18:47

five times the size of the original

18:49

Queen Oak.

18:50

So this must have been here for two or

18:52

three hundred years. Hello,

18:55

alright it's okay. Hi

18:58

there. Is he a red Labrador?

19:00

Yes. Just pure red lab, yeah?

19:03

Well, sold as so. Yeah, no,

19:05

no, no I just wondered if there was a bit of pointer in

19:07

there. Well, I don't know, yeah. He's

19:09

very fine looking. He's only 18 months so he's um...

19:13

He's a good boy. Um... Alright.

19:23

You can hear the um... the

19:25

crescendo building as

19:28

we near the road and that means

19:30

we're getting closer

19:31

to Big Belly Oak. And

19:34

this had been one of your sort of top

19:36

ten hadn't it? Big Belly Oak on the

19:38

list? Yeah, this has actually got a special icon on mine

19:41

that Matt, it's um... it's one

19:43

of the heritage trees. Um, this is in

19:45

about 65 heritage trees on my

19:47

route and this is one of

19:49

them.

19:52

What does that signify? It

19:56

just signifies that it's been recognised

19:58

as a...

19:59

significant tree through our culture and

20:02

our society and has

20:04

appeared in a book called Heritage Trees

20:06

of England, Heritage Trees

20:09

of Scotland and the

20:11

Woodland Trust actually does have a initiative

20:14

this year to visit

20:16

all the heritage trees and just do a

20:19

check on them, just report

20:23

on just how they're doing, what are the threats,

20:26

are they still alive.

20:28

So actually Martin although you're taking unpaid

20:30

sabbatical we are

20:32

technically working today. I guess

20:35

I am. Yeah, there is aspects

20:37

of the

20:40

bustins on a day.

20:45

So we've come to the edge of the forest

20:47

and actually we've got to go over a style because

20:50

the big belly oak is even beyond really

20:53

the outskirts of the forest and

20:55

as you can hear the main road that runs from Morbridge

20:57

Salisbury

20:58

is just the other side of the tree,

21:00

the tree being right next

21:03

to the road with no protection. Well

21:06

it is a squat little dumping of a tree and

21:08

it's got an open hollow section

21:11

open to the south and lots

21:14

of holes within it, not

21:17

very tall, very wide and

21:20

with lots of leaf

21:22

foliage. And

21:25

a big metal iron band around

21:28

the middle of it.

21:28

And also there looks to be a metal cord.

21:31

Yeah it's been braced up in the upper

21:34

canopy which is not that upper but it is

21:36

right on the road isn't it. Yeah, so

21:39

loads of people must drive past it without even realizing.

21:42

Yeah, that does happen.

21:43

How old do we think it is? A thousand

21:47

years pops into my mind. Certainly

21:49

old isn't it, it's huge. And

21:52

you just imagine people have been riding by because

21:54

this would have always been a good route from

21:57

Morbridge Salisbury.

21:59

particularly Salisbury, a real ancient city.

22:04

I wonder if even for a tree of this stature,

22:07

of this character, is there

22:09

a case to be made for just moving the road slightly?

22:13

Give it a bit more space.

22:13

Yeah, I think they could have thought about that a

22:16

few hundred years ago. A

22:21

bit of protection from the cars whizzing by by

22:23

coming right inside the tree. And

22:25

I can stand up to my full height

22:28

and it wouldn't matter if you were a lot taller

22:30

than me. In fact, if you were a lot taller,

22:32

you might be able to poke your head out of the big

22:35

gap in

22:35

there, but gosh,

22:37

being inside a tree of this vulnerability,

22:41

it feels like walking into a temple, really,

22:43

a tree temple.

22:50

We come back in from the road and

22:53

we're gonna walk back towards your

22:56

campsite now and you'll probably

22:58

go out again, won't you, today? Yeah, I'll have a

23:00

spot of lunch and then I'm gonna head out again. I'll

23:03

try to remember to start my watch this time.

23:06

Try to keep track of the miles that I walked. Oh

23:10

look,

23:10

see, here's the trouble. You think, right, we're gonna

23:12

walk fast. And then you have to stop

23:14

because the Mary Louise Oak, which

23:17

is completely bare and pale

23:19

like porcelain. And

23:21

it has a hawthorn growing in front of it, which is in

23:23

full flower.

23:24

How

23:27

long is your route gonna be in total, do you know?

23:30

The route that I've planned is 2,077 miles. Gosh.

23:35

So it's roughly twice as far as a

23:37

more conventional route if you were heading

23:39

to Donna Groats and

23:42

that was your main purpose. Yeah,

23:45

it's pretty winding. Well, I'm

23:47

not

23:47

sure I've helped you in your quest to

23:50

cover any ground at all, but I have hugely

23:52

enjoyed meeting the various

23:55

trees that we have today. And

23:57

also, given that I haven't been to Savanat for

23:59

a...

23:59

I was a child, to

24:02

walk it much more extensively,

24:05

to have the map and be trying

24:07

to find the name trees. I've really enjoyed

24:09

that.

24:09

You've made me feel a kid again, so

24:11

that's great. I've planned to spend two

24:14

additional days in Savonac, so this

24:16

is one of them. It's

24:19

been lovely. Thank you.