Public asked to help survey health of ash trees

The Living Ash Project is asking members of the public to report information about the health of ash trees.

The project is especially interested in those that may have some tolerance to the disease that is threatening Britain’s second-most common broadleaved tree – Chalara ash dieback.

The Living Ash Project aims to identify trees that are tolerant to ash dieback.

The project is employing citizen science – asking members of the public to help in gathering information – to aid in the identification of tolerant trees.

Working with the University of East Anglia’s Adapt Group, a new function has been added to the AshTag app, where members of the public can log into the site at www.ashtag.org/sightings/submit.

Chris Blincoe, of the University of East Anglia, said: "The AshTag app was created at a time when the nation’s ash trees were first under threat from ash dieback and the outlook for the species was pretty bleak.

"Time really was of the essence if we wanted to safeguard our forests and so Adapt had the app up and running just four days after it was confirmed that ash dieback had spread to the UK. Eighteen months on, we are incredibly proud to be in a position to start looking ahead to find a solution to the disease.

"By asking members of the public across the UK to track the health of their local ash trees, we can tap into a wealth of data which could hold the key to locating tolerant trees and safeguard the future of the UK’s ash trees."

The Living Ash Project team are most interested in larger trees but any tree can be surveyed. They are particularly keen to survey ash trees in every corner of Britain, because the genetics of ash trees vary across the country. Ideally, the trees selected need to be surveyed every year for at least three years, so that a detailed picture of their health is built up.

People who want to find out more can visit www.livingashproject.org.uk to take the survey and to get free tags to track the health of their tree.

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