M is for Mushroom

 Or F is for Forest.

The Parish Hall was packed for a showing of The Life of the Forest: Fungi, a Polish documentary by Tomasz Ogrodowczyk, with English narration, and fantastic photography of all sorts of fungi in a Polish forest.  The film covered how essential fungi are to the health of the forest, forming a symbiotic relationship with the trees, the various types of fungi, invasive species (there's one from North America which has become naturalised in the coastal forests, for example, which is collected for food by Polish mushroom pickers).  They also talked about forest management and logging, and regeneration of the forests.

After the film, the panel were introduced.  There's no stage in the Parish Hall, so they had to stand so that everyone could see them.  They were Alex Armstrong, a PhD researcher from the University of Birmingham, Martha Crockatt, a PhD researcher from the University of Oxford, Jenny Dickers, now retired, but her career was in land management, and Ray Woods, botanist, mycologist, and expert in lichen.  The moderator of the panel was Matthew Pryor, a journalist.

The discussion soon moved beyond fungi to all sorts of questions about woodland management, policy making at central government level, nitrogen pollution affecting the growth of fungi, orange lichen on oak trees indicating pollution - and being used by a limestone quarry to see how effective their dust suppression programme was (the smaller the area affected by the lichen, the better they were doing).

Jenny implored us all to think about what sort of woodland we wanted to see, because there are lots of different ideas for the uses of woodland that don't necessarily work well together.  She comes from a farming family, as well as working in conservation, and there was a good discussion about trying to understand how farmers think, so they don't get defensive about new ideas coming in, while at the same time acknowledging that farmers are being pulled in several different directions at once, with some policies aimed at increasing food production, others at conservation and pollution reduction, and those policies often contradict each other.  So they tend to be suspicious of researchers like Alex coming in when actually the researchers could help them.

There's the very prescriptive way the policies are applied, too, without taking account of local conditions, and (for instance) planting hedgerows with hawthorn far too thickly so that no undergrowth can grow - which would be beneficial for insects, birds and so on.  They also talked about policies that led to nitrogen reduction (a good thing) could lead to unintended consequences which were not so good for the health of the forests - it's a very complex problem, and a complex ecosystem.  More research needs to be done on the impact of chicken farms, too, and the use of ammonia scrubbers to take the ammonia emissions out of the atmosphere - but then, what do the farmers do with the ammonia in the scrubbers?  Is it taken away, or is it just moved around the farm?

There's the question, too, of which species of trees to plant to cope with climate change.  Roy Woods said that one scheme in Wales is planting hornbeam - he's not a fan, and would prefer other trees to be planted instead.  He also mentioned the importance of planting trees in upland areas to prevent floods further downstream. 

Also available, on each seat, were copies of the latest Cabbage Leaf, which is all about forests and fungi, with illustrations of local fungi painted by  Françoise Verger, and collected for her by Chris Bradshaw, who has been monitoring local fungi for about five years now.  He asked why it should be that some areas he surveyed had almost no fungi, while other seemingly identical areas had a rich variety.  Roy Woods suggested that it was the difference between valleys that ran east/west, compared to valleys that ran north/south.  Winds bringing nitrogen pollution from the east run up against the edges of woodland in the east/west running valleys and the trees have more nitrogen than they need, while the wind skips over the valleys running north/south.

So a fascinating evening, with a lot of food for thought.

The next event will be G is for Garden, on 9th May - more information nearer the time.  One of the panelists then will be John Crellin, whose book on the flora of Brecknockshire will be out on 9th April.  Layla Robinson's new book is also out, about creating things with dried flowers (she was in the audience, and her book was on display at the back).