Filtered publications and research

Forest Research, Forestry & Land Scotland and Forestry England have co-developed an evidence based, repeatable approach for assessing the biodiversity potential of the National Forest Estate. Several extent, condition, connectivity and diversity metrics are measured and aggregated into a Combined Biodiversity Index. An online, interactive tool allows users to explore mapped scores.

How we manage priority habitats within increasingly fragmented landscapes is a critical conservation issue. Practitioners and policy makers are often faced with the dilemma of deciding where to focus limited…

Exploration of the resilience of woodlands to future change by assessing how ecosystem service values and natural capital stocks of woodlands may be affected by change through the application of the UK National Ecosystem Assessment (UK NEA) scenarios and different management approaches, e.g. forest diversification through the application of forest management alternatives

FR have established how to detect young trees from space using synthetic aperture RADAR and machine learning techniques. This will support the monitoring of the planting of tens of thousands of restock sites and new woodland across Britain. In searching for a solution researchers hypothesised that even if the trees are too small to see, maybe we could ‘feel’ them using Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR). A different technique to utilising optical data, SAR provides ‘fuzzy’ data on the presence of objects, their size, orientation and texture. The research found that this was possible and data on whether sites had tree cover or not has been derived for extensive areas of Britain and NFI are working to operationalise the process.

A multi-partner GB wide transdisciplinary project that takes a holistic approach to enhance diagnostics, identify factors that could lead to spread and formulate response strategies to mitigate the devastating effects of X. fastidiosa.

We are working with Southampton University and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology to develop and test novel modelling frameworks to explore the drivers of ecosystem services at different spatial scales in order to predict and map their delivery.

This report assesses the distribution of Welsh peatlands and gives an overview of the likely impacts of peat forming factors and afforested peatland restoration. National and field based assessment schemes are developed for the assessment of afforested peatland in Wales viable for restoration, as well as a national GIS assessment identifying potential restoration areas in Wales. Field-based assessment are testing by ground truthing a number of sites in Wales and relative costs of afforested peat restoration are provided.

This page summarises the main findings of the project ‘Investigation of canopy throughfall and interception’, partially funded by the EU’s Forest Focus C funding scheme.

This page summarises the results of the ‘Cell wall macromolecules and reaction wood’ (CEMARE) project, funded by the EU’s COST cooperative research programme.

This page summarises the ‘Compression wood in conifers’ (Compression Wood) project, funded by the EU Fifth Framework Programme (FP5).