Forestry and Natural Flood Management

The Forest Hydrology programme involves a number of collaborative studies of the effects of forestry on flood flows. These include long-term studies of the hydrological effects of upland conifer forests in research catchments at Coalburn in north England and Balquhidder in mid-Scotland.

The results indicate that while some forestry practices and phases of forest growth affect peak flows within small headwater catchments, the impacts deminish at the larger catchment scale.

Research objectives

Forests the world over, have long been associated with helping to reduce flooding. Most flooding disasters have been partly blamed on the effects of deforestation.

The cases for and against forestry reducing flooding
The role of forest management and scale
Research results
How native woodlands can help
How a shift to continuous cover forestry may reduce flood risk
The role of floodplain woodlands
Opportunity mapping for trees and flood
Woodland and Natural Flood Management – lessons learned

The impacts of rural land use and management on flood generation were reviewed by a research consortium for Defra.

Flood Research Consortium
Defra: Making Space for Water

Downloads

The role of woodland in flood control was reviewed by Nisbet and Thomas in 2006

PDF, 0.14 MB

FAO UN review of Forests and flooding

PDF, 0.08 MB

Global review of the role of forestry in flooding